


To Touch the Sky

by Xanisis



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/M, Fem!Harry, Female Harry Potter, Sane Voldemort, or more like voldemort as the villain tom riddle should be?, tw: character death, tw: torture
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-11-14
Updated: 2018-07-25
Packaged: 2019-02-02 01:32:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 34,795
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12716961
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Xanisis/pseuds/Xanisis
Summary: In the distance, a man, a monster, a monolith. His soul, crumpled, reformed, incomplete.In the foreground, a girl, a bright eyed, sharp-elbowed walking prophecy. Her fate was a muddled, messy thing.A man smiled, sharp edged.Here, the girl’s gasp, here, his hand on her throat, here, the intersection of two souls in two bodies.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> So, this was heavily influenced by nocturnememory's incredible Ichor Trilogy. I blame her for my obsession with these two (and for making me question how robes work, there aren't going to be robes in this story, I'm sorry). That being said it is definitely it's own story and this is not her Harry and Tom any more than her Harry and Tom are JK's. 
> 
> The story is going to start out following HBP, but it diverges pretty quickly. I'm playing hard and fast with canon, because ummm... I can (and it's been awhile since I read the books). That being said you can take most of the books as canon. Any changes that have to do with Harry's gender should just come up naturally.

Harry Potter was waiting. Waiting had, admittedly, never been one of her strong suits, though it felt as if it was all she did these days. She dug her sneakers into the dirt, marring it. It had been a dry summer, long and hot and lonely, and the clay of the earth cracked under her foot. She stamped it out.

Voldemort had been quiet for the last several months, unnervingly so. At the start of the summer, Harry had even taken to reading the  _ Prophet,  _ an endeavor which she had known would surely lead to madness, but there had been nothing, just the scramble of the Ministry as they realized what she’d known for a year and a half: there was a madman loose among them. 

Fear was spreading across the wizarding world. The same fear that had lived inside her since that night in the graveyard, since that thing, that sick, revolting, half-formed monster of a man, had risen from the cauldron. It was almost validating.

And yet, somehow, despite it all, Harry had simply spent the summer back at Privet Drive, working in a shop down the way, trying to pretend that things were not what they were, and she’d found that if she really tried, all of it, Voldemort and Sirius and the war, the relentless fear of the war, felt like a dream, removed from real life. 

And now, months later, Dumbledore was coming for her. Or so he’d said. She hadn’t seen him, not since she’d raged in his office, not since he’d looked at her with sad eyes and said, “You feel as though you will bleed to death with the pain of it.” But then two weeks ago, he’d sent her a note telling her he would be coming for her. It had felt unreal. 

And so it was the appointed time and Harry was walking the streets of Little Whinging. She’d walked this route a lot this summer for lack of anything better to do. She finished the loop and started back down Privet. It was dinner time and Harry could hear, through the open windows, the sounds of families having dinner, the raucous laughter, the hum of the television screens, the bang of pots. It made her chest ache, a dull, never-ending thud, thud.

 

.

 

Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore was standing in the center of the living room of 4 Privet Drive. Harry didn’t think she’d ever seen someone so out of place. The brightness of his suit against Petunia’s rose wallpaper, the glint of his spectacles in the lamp light, the way that Petunia and Vernon skirted around him as if he were a particularly repugnant rodent. 

“Harry,” he said, in greeting. 

“Sir.” 

“I presume you did not tell your relatives that I would be coming for you,” he said, pleasantly. 

“Er, no,” Harry said. “I guess I should go pack my trunk, then.”

“See that you do,” he said. “Petunia here was just about to tell me about her rutabagas, weren’t you, my dear?.” 

Petunia looked as if she would rather do anything but. 

Harry took the stairs two at a time, frantically gathering her things: a Weasley sweater tossed in with her Transfiguration textbook, a cauldron, a pair of socks, a bundle of letters, unanswered, from Ron and Hermione. 

Within minutes, her room at Privet Drive was stripped bare and she was pulling her trunk down the steps. 

When she returned to the living room, she saw that everything was as she’d left it: Petunia, standing horrified in the corner, Vernon, almost sputtering with rage, and Dumbledore, calmer than seemed polite in the situation, drinking from a mug of tea. 

“Ah, Harry,” Dumbledore said. 

“Ready to go, sir?” she asked. 

“If you’ll sit,” he said. “There are a couple of things that I wish to discuss with you and your relatives.” 

Harry took a seat. The Dursley’s remained standing. Dumbledore set down his mug.

“As you no doubt know,” Dumbledore said. “The wizarding world is in a state of war.” 

“War?” Vernon asked, puffing out his chest. Vernon’s father had been in service and he seemed to feel as if that entitled him to a claim on the military, war or both. “War with who?” 

If Dumbledore was surprised that Harry had not shared the details of the Wizarding World with her family, he didn’t show it. 

“A man who goes by the name of Lord Voldemort,” he said.

The color drained from Petunia’s face.

“That’s the man who…,” killed my parents, Harry thought. “But I thought he was dead,” she said.

“Ah,” Dumbledore said. “For men like Voldemort the space between dead and alive is rather more complicated than all that.”

 

.

 

To put it simply, once there had been a boy named Tom Riddle and once there had been a soul, split eight ways. But of course, things are never simple, are they?

Voldemort leaned back in his chair, studying the fireplace, the play of light and dark, the crackle of flames. The whiskey burned on the way down, curling in his stomach, but it didn’t warm him. No, Voldemort couldn’t remember the last time he felt warm.

An insidious whisper, _ it takes a monstrous act to split a soul, didn’t you know?  _

He did not often think of his time in between, the empty stretch of it. Death was something to be feared, after all. He had been right in that aspect, at least. But he’d learned something else in the darkness. A soul split eight ways was a soul full of longing. It wanted to be complete, you see. Men were never meant to be gods. Men were never meant to be immortal. Tom Riddle had not known this. But Voldemort did. His sin had been hubris, and this, this mutation of form, this half-formed creature he had become, was the gods revenge. 

Now, he watched the flames. Now, he planned his reawakening. Now, he felt the stretch of his consciousness, pressed too thin, and, always lingering, like an afterthought, a ghost in his periphery, he felt her:  _ Harry Potter _ .

 

.

 

“Where are we going, sir?” Harry asked. 

“Just a brief stop with an old friend,” Dumbledore said. 

He’d sent her trunk on ahead to the Burrow and so she walked unencumbered down the street. It was an unfamiliar neighborhood, well-off, by the looks of it, but suburban. It was late, and the houses were dark and spooky in the dim lamplight.  

“I’m sorry, sir, but what exactly am I doing here?” she asked.

“Oh, I’ll find a use for you,” he said. 

They walked in silence down the street.

“Er, sir,” Harry said.

“Yes, Harry,” Dumbledore said. It was strange, Harry thought, to see him outside of school. She would have felt better with a desk between them. 

“Is there something wrong with you hand, sir?” 

Dumbledore raised his hand as if in surprise. It really was a ghastly sight, black and rotting. “Nothing to worry about, my dear. I wish to talk about you. Now tell me,” he said, peering at her over his spectacles.”Has your scar been bothering you at all?”

She shook her head. “It’s been quiet all summer. The dreams too.” 

Dumbledore considered her.

“I would have thought, with him being back, it would have been worse,” she said. “But instead, there’s nothing.” She could still feel the bond, but it felt empty.“It feels like he’s, I don’t know, like he’s hiding from me.”

“It wouldn’t surprise me,” Dumbledore said, after a long moment, where he simply looked at her. Harry shifted her feet. “It’s far past time that he stopped underestimating you.”

“Me?” Harry asked. 

“Indeed,” Dumbledore said. They had come to a gate, and he held it open for her. “After you, my dear.”

_ What does Voldemort have to fear from me?  _ Harry thought. 

 

.

 

“Tell me the news is good.”

Rufus Scrimgeour had been Prime Minister for less than a month and he already felt as if he had aged twenty years. He had been a young man in the first war, but he was no longer as young as he had once been.

“I would, sir, but--” 

“But there’s nothing,” Scrimgeour finished for him. Kingsley nodded. “And you’ve been in contact with the Muggle Prime Minister?” 

“Yes, sir. She doesn’t believe the attacks on Muggle London are related to magic, but then she wouldn’t, would she?”

“No, I suppose not,” Scrimgeour said. “Do we have any evidence that it’s Him?”

“Not yet, sir.” 

“Keep digging, Kingsley, he can’t stay hidden forever.”

“Sir.” And then Kingsley was gone, leaving Scrimgeour alone. He poured himself a finger of firewhiskey and then, considering the glass, another.

It had been three months since the attack on the ministry, three months of chaos. And yet, for all that, for all the panic and the pandemonium, there was very little to show for it. 

People were frightened, yes, and they had reason to be, Scrimgeour knew the man, Lord Voldemort. But it was the anticipation of violence more than any actual act that was causing chaos. Scrimgeour had been hunting Dark Wizards all his life, he knew how to fight, how to win, it was the waiting that unnerved him. He was not a patient man.

And this, he sensed, was only the beginning. 

 

.

 

“How have you been, Horace?” Dumbledore asked.

The other man, plump and red faced, had barely taken his eyes off of Harry since she had come into the house. Harry tucked a piece of hair behind her ear self-consciously. 

“Oh, well you know,” Slughorn said. “This dreadful war, it’s gotten everyone quite stirred up.”

Dumbledore’s eyes were knowing. “It has,” he agreed. 

“I’ve been on the run,” Slughorn said. “Never staying in the same place for long, always afraid, it feels like, well, it feels like seventeen years ago. And I’m not as young as I once was, Dumbledore.” 

“No, nor am I,” Dumbledore said.

Harry still had no clue what she was doing there.

“If you were, perhaps, to return to Hogwarts…”

“Not this again,” Slughorn protested. 

“Perhaps it would ease some of the stress,” he said. “I’m simply asking you to consider it, Horace.”

“Ah, well, Dumbledore, you know, I don’t really think -- are you leaving already?” Dumbledore had stood up. Harry wondered if she was supposed to as well. 

“Simply wondering if I might use your bathroom.” 

“Oh, well, I suppose so. Down the hall and to the left.”

It was quiet for a moment. Harry felt Slughorn’s eyes upon her. She didn’t like him looking at her, and she shifted, uncomfortable. 

“You look very like your mother,” Slughorn said. Harry had heard this enough that she supposed it must be true, though she didn’t really see the resemblance between her and the pictures she had of her mother. Her mother was beautiful, and she, she was just Harry.

“You aren’t supposed to have favorites as a teacher, you know, but she was one of mine. Incredible potions maker, and a great woman too. I used to tell her she should have been in my house, you know.”

“And which house is that?” Harry asked. It seemed unfair that Slughorn should know her mother when Harry herself did not. 

“I was Head of Slytherin,” he said, and seeing Harry’s face, he laughed. “Oh, but don’t you hold it against me. We’re not all bad, you know? I had some very impressive witches and wizards in my day. I suppose you’re in Gryffindor?” 

Harry nodded. 

“A shame,” he said. 

Harry hummed.

“You mustn’t misunderstand, Harry,” Slughorn said. “It’s not that I don’t want to take a position at Hogwarts, it’s just that in the current climate, with things being as they are, I don’t think it’s the best idea.” 

“Right,” Harry said. “Sure.” 

“It’s just aligning myself with the Order of the Phoenix--”

“Against Voldemort, you mean,” Harry said, turning her gaze back to the man. 

Slughorn looked uncomfortable at the name. “Well,” he says. “Of course I’m not in support of Him, but you never know--”

“No,” Harry said. “I suppose you really don’t.” 

 

.

 

The halls of Hogwarts were nearly empty, the ancient building quiet and still. Only the portraits were awake. Voldemort ran his hand along the banister, felt the familiar, worn stone. He had not been here for years, not since Dumbledore had refused him the defence job and he’d left the diadem in the first place. 

He had almost forgotten how many memories were housed here. There, in the corner, Tom Riddle at eleven, young and awe stricken. How wondrous it all had seemed to him, how improbably delightful.

Soon, he knew, Harry Potter would be back here, walking these same halls. He could almost see her, feel the flicker of her presence, almost as familiar to him as his own. He wondered if she loved it as he did, the cluttered, haphazard, magical nature of it all. Hogwarts had been, after all, his first real home.

He stopped in front of the worn tapestry on the seventh floor. How many times had he stood here at twelve? At fourteen? At seventeen? Now, he was an old man, gnarled, deformed, a patchwork creature.  _ I’m looking for something I’ve lost. _

And the door swung open.

 

.

 

Harry always felt better at the Burrow. If she could have created a home from just her imaginings she would have made it like this: messy and disorganized, random jutting staircases and overstuffed armchairs, worn wooden floors and too loud voices, the smell of cinnamon and cloves, and warm, always so warm. 

“You look right skinny, mate,” Ron said, poking her in the shoulder. 

Harry was curled up on Ron’s floor in a blanket that smelled like him, eating a pile of Molly’s famous brownies which Molly had thrust at her after making Harry eat a full dinner, sausage and potatoes and a heaping serving of green beans. Harry had eaten it all, though it had tasted like nothing to her.

“Hmm,” Harry hummed.

She didn’t know how to explain her summer, the deadness of it.  How she would find chunks of time missing, empty space. Eating hadn’t necessarily been a priority.

“Have a brownie,” she said, instead. 

Ron frowned, but he took the proffered pastry. Hermione on the other side of him was watching Harry closely enough that it was making her uncomfortable

“It’s been right crazy ‘round here, of course,” Ron said, leaning back, mouth full of brownie. “Mum’s going completely mental because Bill got engaged to--” 

“Oh, let’s not go into it,” Hermione said. 

“Why?” Harry asked. 

“Because Hermione hates her too, she’s always going on about--”

“Shut it, Ronald,” Hermione said, whacking him on the back of the head, while Harry laughed. She’d missed them both. The easiness between them. “Besides that’s not what’s interesting,” Hermione continued, turning back to Harry. “We want to know how you are.”

“‘Me?” Harry said. “‘M fine. Honestly.”

Hermione didn’t look convinced. “You know, Harry, it would be alright not to be okay.”

She shrugged. “I know,” she said. “I just don’t want to think about it, alright?”

“Alright,” Hermione said, her eyes softening. This was one of the things Harry loved most about Hermione. She knew when not to push her. Harry took her hand, felt the familiar creases of her palm. Hermione squeezed back, a comforting weight.

“Well,” Hermione said. “Tell us this at least. Where did Dumbledore take you?”

 

.

 

“I’m so out of shape,” Ron whined, panting. 

“Took the summer off?” Harry grinned.

“Well, I’ve been a bit busy, haven’t I?”  

Harry laughed. “Waiting on Fleur, you mean?”

That morning, Harry had stumbled downstairs and found the half veela sitting at the breakfast table, looking far too put together for the early hour. Harry hadn’t even managed to brush her hair. 

Ron blushed. “Shove it,” he said. 

Harry directed the broom upward, feeling the familiar rush in her chest. She’d missed flying. It made her feel wildly envious of those like Ron, who never had to give it up. She would fly every day if she could. And one day, she knew, she would be able to. Soon, she would never have to go back to the Dursleys. 

She dove towards the ground, feeling the wind rush through her hair, pulling it free from her ponytail. She let out a whoop of joy. She could hear Ron behind her, yelling, see the ground rushing up towards her, closer and closer, until it was almost upon her, and then she pulled the handle up abruptly and she was careening back into the sky. 

“Bloody hell, Harry,” Ron said when she reached him. “You fucking scared me.” 

“What?” she asked, pushing her hair out of her face. The wind had snarled it into a tangled riot of curls. “It’s just a bit of fun.” 

“If you say so,” he said, but she could still feel his eyes on her, worried.

“I do,” she said, rolling and sending her broom into a spin. 

She flew until she couldn’t think at all. Until there wasn’t anything but the wind. 

 

.

 

Harry hadn’t particularly felt like celebrating her birthday, but the Weasleys had insisted and Harry’d bowed to peer pressure. It was nice of them, Harry thought, but she wished that it were just her and Ron and Hermione. It was hard to act cheery at a gathering that mainly consisted of Order members. 

She missed Sirius. It was a thought that she didn’t normally allow herself to have. But at times like this it rose to the forefront, sharp and painful. 

“Hey there, sweetheart,” she heard from behind her. And then she was barreling into Remus Lupin’s arms. 

“I missed you,” she said, words muffled by his tweed jacket. 

He held her tightly, squeezing hard enough that her lungs ached, before he let her go. He looked tired, Harry thought, examining his face, and older than he had the last time she’d seen him. His smile was bittersweet. 

“And I you,” he said. “How are you holding up?”

Harry felt tears prick her eyes. Suddenly, she was very aware of Kingsley eating cake two seats down. 

“I keep thinking he’ll write to me,” she said. “Is that stupid?”

“No,” Remus said. “No, it’s not stupid at all.”

 

.

 

“And of course,” Hermione said. “It’s not as if I necessarily expected to get Os in all ten, but still, I think it’s really unfair, when faced with the practical--”

“We all know you’re a genius, ‘Mione,” Ron said, crunching on an ice cream cone, the ice cream dripping all over his hands. Harry could see Hermione watching it with barely concealed horror. 

“Oh, yes, well that’s kind, Ronald, but--”

Harry held the door to Madame Malkin’s open for the other two, Hermione still chattering about her scores. They had received their OWLS earlier in the week, and while Harry hadn’t done horribly, she hadn’t made the required NEWT potions grade, which meant that any hope she might have had of being an Auror was effectively dashed. She hadn’t expected to make an O, of course, Snape was notoriously exacting, and he seemed to hold Harry to even higher standards, but still, there’d been a sinking feeling in her chest looking at that little E. If she wasn’t meant to be fighting Dark Wizards, then what was she meant to be doing?

Going inside, Harry almost bumped headlong into Draco Malfoy. 

He looked terrible, his pale face sunken and drawn. And while he was dressed as impeccably as ever, shirt tucked in tight, hair gelled back from his face, there was an air of dishevelment about him that unnerved her. 

“Watch it, Potter,” he snarled, but there wasn’t the normal bite to it. 

“Sorry,” she said, automatically stepping back. In a moment, he was down the street and out of sight.

“That was weird, right?” she asked Ron and Hermione. 

“What?” Ron asked. Chocolate had dripped onto his shirt. 

“Malfoy,” she said. “He looked weird, right?”

“He looked like a right git, I imagine,” Ron said. “Like he always does.”

“Yeah, maybe,” Harry said. 

“Harry,” Hermione asked. “Do you think we should get trousers this year or just stick with the skirt? Oh, well, you know the trousers are practical, but the skirt is more traditional, isn’t it?”

“Go, try them on,” Harry said.“I’ll give you my opinion then.”

Harry glanced again back towards the window where Malfoy had gone. Odd, she thought.

 

.

 

Weasley’s Wizards Wheezes was the brightest shop on the block. Wherein most of Diagon Alley looked grim, the people stony faced and frightened, the joke shop was flourishing. Harry supposed they all needed something to laugh about.  

“Bloody hell,” Ron said. “It’s mad brilliant, isn’t it?”

The shop was packed full of people, and the three of them had to elbow their way up to the front. 

“Harry!” the twins called upon seeing her, both of them throwing their arms around her, squeezing her between them. She found herself laughing. 

“What? No greeting for your brother?” Ron huffed. 

“Aw, Ronniekins, don’t feel left out,” George said, ruffling the younger boy’s hair.

He shrugged them off.

“Feel free to look around,” Fred said. “For you, Harry, anything you want, free.”

She frowned. “I couldn’t,” she said.

“You’re our mysterious benefactor. Of course you can,” George said, shoving her off into the bustle of the crowd.

The shop almost felt like a candy store for magic, Harry thought. Everywhere she looked there were bright gizmos and what’s its, everything she had imagined as a child that magic could be and more. Near the front, there was a bright pink table, advertising: “Looking for love? Look no further!” 

“Love potions,” Hermione said, curling her lip. 

“Alright there, Harry?” a voice asked. 

Harry turned and saw Michael Corner peering down at her. 

“Oh, hey Michael,” she said. “Have a good summer?”

“Not bad, you?” he said. 

“Alright,” she said, distracted. Hermione had disappeared from her side.  

“You thinking of doing D.A again this year?” he asked. 

“Oh,” Harry said. “Um, I hadn’t really thought about it.” 

Michael shifted. Harry saw Hermione in the far corner and she tried to make eye contact.

“Well, I guess I’ll see you around, then?” he asked.

“Oh, right, yeah,” she said. “See you.”

Harry pushed her way through to Hermione, grabbing the other girl’s arm. 

“Why’d you leave me?” Harry asked. 

“Harry,” Hermione said, not unaffectionately. “You had to notice that poor boy was trying to flirt with you.”

“Who?” Harry asked. “Michael?” She looked dubiously around for the Ravenclaw. 

“Yes, Michael,” Hermione said, briskly. “Honestly, Harry, you’re even more hopeless than I am.”

“Yes, well,” Harry said, looping her arm through Hermione’s. “Boys are overrated anyhow.”

 

.

 

Voldemort had always found the seaside beautiful. When he had come as a boy, it had seemed so different from the orphanage with its dull, crumbling walls and dreary hallways. 

It was the same now. He felt as if he were ten again, leading little Mary and Caroline into the dark. How frightened they had been. How their fear had fed him. 

In the back of his mind, he could feel Harry’s happiness, the bubble of her delight in his chest. It was distracting. Over the past several weeks, she’d seemed happier, like she’d been sleeping for months and now she was awake.  It annoyed him that he’d noticed. But while he’d blocked himself from her, her walls were flimsy, ephemeral things. He could still feel her consciousness brushing his with every breath, her emotions, her thoughts, bleeding into his own.. 

_ \-- wish that Sirius were here, I know it’s stupid, but I still think about -- _

\--   _ Hermione’s watching me too closely, I wonder if she can tell I -- _

_ \-- he’d looked at me like like like  -- _

Voldemort tried to tune her out, turning his gaze out to the ocean, watching the undulation of the waves until his mind was clear and steady, and then he stepped off the edge of the cliff. 

 

.

 

While Harry had been at the Dursley’s she couldn’t wait for the school year to begin, but now that she was at the Burrow, Harry just wanted the summer to stretch on a little longer. She was not quite ready to face her schoolmates, all of them eager to hear about Voldemort and the night at the Ministry, things she would rather not think about. 

But soon September 1st arrived and they were bundled off to the train. The Order had come to escort them, mainly for Harry’s safety she knew, which made her feel awkward and self-conscious. Still, she was glad to see Remus and Tonks.

On the platform, Remus stopped her before she got on the train with a hand on her elbow. 

“I want you to be extra careful this year,” he said. His amber eyes were worried and his grip on her arm edged on being too tight. “We don’t know what’s coming and I want you to be prepared.”

“I will,” she said. “Don’t worry about me, Remus.”

“I always worry about you, sweetheart,” he said, pulling her into his arms.

She breathed in his familiar smell, old books and leather. 

“Stay safe,” he breathed into her hair. 

“You too,” she said. 

And then he was letting go of her and she was getting on the train and they were pulling away, and he became just a blip in the distance. 

 

.

 

“Harry, there you are, my dear,” Slughorn said, putting an arm around her shoulder. He smelled like incense and palm oil, an overwhelming and not particularly pleasant scent. 

“Did you have a good rest of the summer, sir,” she asked.

Slughorn was steering her down the hallway, away from Luna, who had come up to Harry to talk to her about Wrackspurts and was now waving cheerily as Harry disappeared down the corridor. 

“I can’t complain, I can’t complain,” he said. “Come into my cabin. I’m having a few guests over, just a select number of students, you understand.”

“Oh, I’m sure I wouldn’t want to intrude, really sir--”

Slughorn all but shoved her into the compartment, so that Harry almost stumbled to the ground. When she straightened, she saw that Blaise Zabini was eyeing her.

“What are you looking at?” she asked him.

“Pleasant,” he said. “No, really lovely, Potter. My summer was swell, thanks for asking.”

“Oh, fuck off, Zabini,” Ginny said. Harry, grateful for an ally, went to her sit beside her, just as Slughorn slid the door closed. 

“So, now then,” he said. “Let’s get this party started, shall we?”

Zabini, across from Harry, grinned.

 

.

 

Harry officially hated Horace Slughorn.

“Oh, he’s mental alright,” Ginny agreed, as they headed back towards their own compartment.

“Even the name’s disgusting,” Harry said. “Who wants to be part of the Slug Club?” 

“Oh well, Gran was part of it,” Neville said. “I’m sure she’s expecting me to join as well.”

“Potter,” Harry heard, and she turned and saw Malfoy standing behind her. 

He looked even worse than he had when she’d seen him in Diagon Alley, his face waxen and drawn, his collar unbuttoned and crumpled. It was obvious he had put a valiant effort into looking normal, but it had failed miserably. He looked almost like a caricature of himself. 

“Can I talk to you for a moment?” he asked. 

Harry glanced back at Neville and Ginny who were both looking on incredulously.  

“Um, sure,” Harry said, uncomfortably. “I’ll meet you guys back at the compartment.” 

Malfoy was silent for a long time even after the two had left. 

“Yes?” Harry said. “You wanted something?” 

He was clenching his jaw, the muscle standing out in sharp contrast. 

“I wanted to say I was sorry,” he said. 

“For what?” Harry said, suspiciously. 

“For whatever you want,” he said. “For all of it.” 

“For five years of torment, you mean?” she asked.

“Yes,” he said. It was obvious that it was paining him to say this, and Harry couldn’t quite imagine why he was. 

“For being a nasty git to me and all of my friends?” Harry asked. 

Malfoy huffed out a breath. His hair had fallen out of it’s careful placement and hung in limp, pale strands around his face. “Yes,” he said. 

“What do you want?” 

“Would you just fucking accept my apology?” he hissed. “Do you have to be so relentlessly difficult?” 

“You’re not really endearing yourself to me,” Harry said, crossing her arms. 

“I’m sorry,” he said, again. He sighed, suddenly, deflating. “Take that as you will,” he said.

And then he was turning and disappearing down the train. Harry watched him for a moment, confused, and then, with one more backwards glance, started back towards her own compartment. 

 

.

 

“What happened to his hand?” Hermione asked. 

“It looked that way when he came and picked me up,” Harry said. “I thought it would have been healed by now.” 

“It must be cursed,” Hermione said. Harry could already see she was longing to go look it up. 

“Speaking of cursed,” Ron said. “Snape,” he paused, “as the Defense teacher. Like Severus Snape. Our Snape. It’s like his wet dream or something.”

“I really didn’t want to think about Snape having wet dreams,” Harry said.

“Well, you’re going to have to start doing DA again,” Hermione said, briskly. 

Harry looked over at her. “You think?” 

“People’ll be clawing down the doors to come,” Ron said. “You know, the Chosen One and all that.” 

Harry groaned. “Don’t remind me,” she said. 

“You’ve reached a new level of fame, mate,” Ron said, cheerily. “Fighting Voldemort off for the second time will do that for you.”

“I didn’t really do anything,” Harry muttered, shoving the peas around on her plate. 

Harry didn’t like to think of the fight at the Department of Mysteries, not  _ his _ cloying presence, how it had enveloped her, become her, how she had opened her mouth and his voice had slithered out, not the way that he had looked at her, red eyes blown wide, as if she had, for once, surprised him, not the way he’d said her name, how it hadn’t sounded like her name at all, how he’d said it like she was someone else, like she was-- She didn’t know.

“I didn’t do anything,” Harry repeated.

 

.   
  
  
Number 12 Grimmauld Place was a grimy, depressing house, and although it was obvious some attempt had been made to make the place more hospitable — the glowing orbs on the staircase, the empty splotches on the wall where old portraits must have once been — it was still almost embarrassingly bedraggled. It embodied, Voldemort thought, everything that he’d always despised about purebloods. Fools, the lot of them.

They had left a smattering of trick courses on the steps of the house, but he scattered them with a wave of his hand. Paltry work, as if they could keep him out. 

He could sense the locket in the house, a glowing beacon. There was something seductive in the call of the Horcruxes, something almost intoxicating. He felt more real in their presence, like something new had clicked into place. 

It was hard to imagine Harry here in this house. She seemed to bright to exist in a place as drab is this. The only times he had seen her, admittedly, were in moments of battle -- the darkness of the old Riddle graveyard, her face drawn and pale, a streak of red hair like blood across her cheek, the stark white of the ministry’s atrium, the bright green of her eyes, the way she’d looked at him like she was seeing a monster from her nightmares -- but that would change soon.

In the center of the kitchen, the brightest room in the house, a house-elf was muttering to himself. The creature looked up when he came into the room as if in surprise. It really must have been far gone if it had not noticed him enter the house. 

“Who are you?” it asked. A rude creature. 

“I’m your Lord,” Voldemort said. “And I’m looking for something.”    
  


.

 

“Is it bad that I’m already exhausted?” Harry asked. It was only the second day of term and it already felt like a lifetime.

“Oy, fuck off,” Ron said, as another third year attempted to squeeze in next to Harry on the bench. The boy squeaked and then darted off.

“Nah,” Ron said, turning back to Harry. “I mean it’s been right mental since we’ve been back, hasn’t it? A girl asked me to sign her tits the other day, and I mean, I barely did anything, did I?”

“Oh, and I’m sure that was such a hardship for you, wasn’t it, Ronald?” Hermione said, sniffily.

Ron blushed and Harry laughed.

“Well, I’m glad my fame is doing some good,” she said.

“Don’t be a dick,” Ron said.

“She’s not signing autographs,” Hermione said as another third year came up to them.

The girl looked uncomfortable. “Um, I,” she said. “Well, Headmaster Dumbledore he asked me to give you this message.” She thrust her hand out and then skittered off.

“Geez, Hermione,” Ron said. “Terrify much?”

“Honestly, Ronald,” Hermione said, flushing. “As if you don’t yell at anyone that comes near Harry.”

“Yeah, but I do it with tact, don’t I?”

Harry unfolded the piece of paper.

“He wants to meet me,” Harry said. “Something about doing private lessons this year?”

“Oh, well, that isn’t really a surprise, is it?” Hermione said. “That he’d want to prepare you? For what’s to come?”

What was to come? Harry wondered. 

“No,” Harry said. “No, I suppose not.”

 

.

 

Albus Dumbledore turned away from the Pensieve. Somehow he always managed to fool himself, to convince himself that if he took the memories from his head and placed them in the bowl they would weigh on him less.

A boy, his grin, and a girl, red-headed and too young, James Potter standing in this office, saying, "How can we make her safe, Albus?"

“She is still too young,” he told Fawkes. The phoenix blinked at him sadly. He laid his good hand on the bird’s head. 

Normally Fawkes had the ability to give him peace, but peace was hard won these days. He did not know if he had another war inside him. He had seen too much pain already.

And, he knew, it had only just begun.

 

.

 

It was late in the evening, after everyone had already gone to bed -- Ron with a muffled yawn and a hand ruffling Harry’s hair, Hermione with a worried look -- and Harry found herself alone in the Gryffindor common room. She had told Hermione she had wanted to finish her first essay for Transfiguration -- NEWT levels, as Hermione had promised, were much more difficult than OWLs -- but really she had simply wanted some time to herself. She had thought, this summer, that she had her fill of solitude, but it felt, now, like a giant hole within herself, consuming. 

She found herself watching the fire, studying the flames. It really was too warm for a fire, but she found that she liked it anyway. She couldn’t seem to get warm, these days. The flames licked their way up the grate, red and orange and bright white. She found herself lulled into an almost sleep-like state. She was still there, in the common room -- she could feel the soft velvet of her favorite armchair, and the weight of her hair against her shoulders, the warmth of the fire against her side -- but so too she could feel him. 

_ Harry,  _ he said, his voice like the stroke of a palm. 

And then she woke up. 

 


	2. Chapter 2

Harry squinted down at the Potions textbook Slughorn had handed to her. Someone had scribbled in the margins of it in an untidy hand, the words almost obscuring the actual instructions underneath. How odd.

She was so focused on the book that she almost didn’t notice the chair being pulled out beside her. 

“Alright there, Potter?”

Draco Malfoy was sitting next to her, the bizarreness of that simple fact momentarily threw Harry off guard. She was about to respond when Slughorn called the class to order.

“You can’t sit here,” she hissed. 

Malfoy just leaned back in his seat. He looked better than he had on the express, more like the Malfoy she was used to.

Slughorn was explaining the assignment, but Harry wasn’t listening, staring in astonishment instead at Malfoy’s profile. 

“Pay attention,” Malfoy said. “Class has started.”

Harry kicked his chair and he started. She was pleased to see bright splotches of irritation cross his cheeks, a familiar sight. 

“Miss Potter,” Slughorn said, genially. “Would you like to tell this class what this potion is?” He held a small bottle of what looked to Harry like liquid gold.

“It’s Felix Felicis, sir.”

Harry turned to look at Malfoy.

“Indeed it is,” Slughorn said, “and what does it do, Mr.?”

“Malfoy and,” he looked over at Harry, “respectively, sir, it helps a guy get lucky, so to speak.”

His gaze was lewd, and Harry untucked her hair so it fell in a shield between them. Perv.

Slughorn just chucked happily. “Quite right,” he said, “So to speak, of course. And this bottle will be the prize of whichever pair makes the best attempt at a Draught of Living Death at the end of the semester, one bottle each of pure liquid luck. Off you go.”

Harry bent further over her book. The instructions were impossible to decipher, covered as they were in ink. By the time Harry had figured out what the first step was meant to be, Malfoy was already back from the store cupboard.

“We’re not working together,” she told him.

“I think we are,” he said. 

She looked at him.

“Relax, Potter, it’s just Potions,” he said, running a hand through his hair, looking almost boyishly endearing. Malfoy endearing. It didn’t fit.

“Okay,” she said, worrying her lip. “Just don’t do anything, alright?”

“Have you suddenly become a potions master without my knowledge?” he asked.

She narrowed her eyes. “No, but I don’t want you -- I don’t know -- accidentally poisoning me or something.”

Malfoy surprised her by simply laughing. “If I was going to kill you, this wouldn’t be how I’d do it.” 

She could feel the beginnings of a headache emerging at her temples. 

“Fine,” she said, “Then just pass me the valerian roots.”

 

.

 

“I don’t know it was fucking weird. You think it’s weird too, right?” 

Ron looked up from where he was examining his Charms essay with barely concealed horror.

“Er, yes? Sorry I wasn’t really listening.”

“Malfoy,” she said. “He’s being nice all the sudden.”

“Maybe he fancies you,” Hermione said, with such a sensible air that Harry couldn’t tell if she was joking or not. 

“What? Malfoy? Like Draco Malfoy?” Ron asked. 

“Yes, that Malfoy,” Hermione said, crossing something off in her planner.

Ron seemed to think about it for a second and then shrugged. “Yeah, maybe.”

Harry gaped at the two of them. 

“That’s, that’s,” she stammered, “No, I mean there’s something nefarious going on here.”

Hermione gave her a look. 

“Draco Malfoy doesn’t  _ fancy  _ me,” Harry said. “This is, I don’t know, his latest plot or something.” 

“If you say so,” Hermione said. 

“I do,” Harry said, slumping further into the armchair.

Draco Malfoy fancying her. Honestly.

 

.

 

“When are tryouts, mate?” Ron asked her, the next day at breakfast. 

“Oh,” Harry said. 

The Captain’s badge had come with her Hogwarts letter. She had put it away as soon as she’d seen it, sliding it along with her OWL scores back into her trunk. She hadn’t taken it out since. But she hadn’t given it back either. 

“I mean, I’m not sure I’m going to take it.”

Ron had been mid-chew and made a horrendous choking nose. Harry patted his back awkwardly. 

“But you have to,” Ron said, once he had recovered. 

She knew that her reasons for wanting to give up the Captainship would be incomprehensible to Ron. She didn’t know how to explain that she didn’t want to take up any more space, that being Captain turned Quidditch, the thing that had always been her escape, into just another burden to bear. 

“Just with everything--” she started.

“Rubbish,” Ron said. “You’re doing it.”

And so that was that. 

 

.

 

“Hey, Harry,” Luna said. “Hermione.” 

“Hey, Luna,” Harry said, after a beat, once it was clear that Hermione, her head buried in her Runes textbook, wasn’t going to say anything. 

The Ravenclaw settled into an empty spot in the grass, regarding Harry openly. There was an unashamed quality to Luna that Harry had always admired, but still found vaguely unsettling. Harry turned her attention to the grass, mashing pieces of it between her fingers. 

“Are you thinking of doing DA again?” Luna asked, a strangely direct question for her. 

“Umm.. maybe,” Harry said. The grass had stained her hands a bloody green. 

“Oh, well, I just had my first lesson with Professor Snape yesterday.” 

Harry waited for her to say something more, but she didn’t. 

“How’d it go?” Harry asked, after a pause. 

“Oh, alright, I suppose,” Luna said. “But it wasn’t like your lessons.” 

It was a kind thing to say, and Harry found herself momentarily touched. She couldn’t really imagine doing DA again, not after defence had so blatantly failed her. What right had she to stand up and pretend that she knew what she was doing? 

“Thanks, Luna,” Harry said. 

“You’re welcome,” Luna said. And then she lay back on the grass, staring up at the sky. “The nargles are out today,” she declared. 

Harry looked at Hermione for support and found her still buried in her book. 

“Yeah,” she said. “I bet they are.”

 

.

 

Snape’s eyes lingered on Harry as she was gathering her things.

His class hadn’t been as bad as they had feared it would be (Ron’s running theory had been that he was going to pelt them all with Bat Boogey’s until they agreed to be his eternal slaves). It had been surprisingly normal even. Still Harry couldn’t help the wave of distrust she felt when she saw the man. She knew that it might have been irrational, but she couldn’t help blaming him, at least partially, for Sirius’s death. She had seen how his antagonism had grated on Sirius, pressed him further into his restlessness, his unhappiness. It was just like Snape to always press.

“Miss Potter,” he called. “If you would stay after for a moment, please.”

“Looks like Potty’s in trouble,” Zabini crowed as he went by. 

“Original,” she told him. 

Ron and Hermione shot her a look, but she just shrugged.

“Have you been keeping up with your Occlumency?” Snape asked once the class had emptied out in a way that made it abundantly clear that he knew the answer was no.

She didn’t think it would ever not be strange to see Snape in this room. He belonged in the dungeons, amid the dark torches and winding passageways. He did not belong in this room where Lupin had once showed Harry how to produce a patronus. 

“Er, not really-- sir,” she added, a bit too late. “He, er the Dark Lord, I mean, has been rather quiet.”

Snape raised an eyebrow. “And you took that to mean, what exactly? That he was going to leave you alone forever?”

Harry flushed. She didn’t think it would be helpful to say that she was rubbish at Occlumency and probably always would be. He would probably just agree. 

“It’s not like I want--”

“Our lessons shall resume,” he said. 

“I think that Professor Dumbledore--”

“Are you implying that you could not use the practice?” he said. 

“No, of course not,” she said. 

“This Friday night, then,” he said. “Nine sharp.”

“Yes, sir,” Harry said.

 

.

 

“What did Snape want?” Ron asked once Harry made it down to dinner, slinging her bag onto the empty bench.

“For me to take up Occlumency again,” Harry said. 

Hermione’s gaze sharpened. “You’re not hearing  _ him _ again, are you Harry?” 

“No,” Harry said, stabbing a piece of broccoli. And she wasn’t. Not really. It was just a feeling. 

“I mean it’s not a bad idea, is it?” Ron said. 

“We should probably all learn, honestly,” Hermione added. “I mean it is an incredibly useful, if complex, subset of magic and really the understanding of it takes the sort of mental discipline that few people are able to manage--”

“Yeah,” Harry said, not really listening.

Draco Malfoy was staring at her. And not in his normal, snotty, Potter stinks kind of way. She caught his eye, making a face, but he just laughed. Hermione followed the exchange with a knowing expression, as if to say,  _ see. _

Already, it seemed, this year was gearing up to be as unpleasant as the last.

 

.

 

“Do you know when you’re starting lessons with Dumbledore?” Hermione asked her as they were getting ready for bed.

Harry ran a hand through her hair. It was longer than it had been last year, waving past her collarbone. “Saturday, I think.”

“Any clue what you’re going to be doing?” she asked. Harry could hear the soft sound of the sink running and then the click as it cut off. 

“Advanced dueling, maybe, I don’t know,” she said.

“It’s a little bit exciting, isn’t it?” Hermione said. “I mean think of all the things he knows.”

Harry sighed. “Yeah, I suppose,” she said.

“You okay?” Harry had been leaning against the dresser, but straightened when Hermione stuck her head back in from the bathroom. 

“Yeah, of course,” she said. 

“Harry--” Hermione started. 

“Really, Hermione, I don’t want to talk about any of it,” she said. “I just want some time, to I don’t know, pretend none of it happened, just for a bit, okay?”

Hermione didn’t look convinced, but she nodded.

“You’d tell me though, if it was really bad?”

“Of course,” Harry said. “Of course I would.”

 

.

 

It was late at night and Harry couldn’t sleep. She was trying, desperately, not to think about the other night, the curious,  _ familiar _ brush of Voldemort’s mind against hers. All summer, she’d felt so distanced from him. Last year, the endless spiralling dreams, the prickling wrongness of her skin, the constant awareness that he was out there, had faded like a bad dream. That had been some other Harry Potter who had seen, had felt those things. 

He’s not here, she told herself.

In the next bed over, Parvati shifted in her sleep. The soft rustle of the bedsheets. The whistle of the wind against the window, a kiss. 

He’s not here, she told herself. 

I will close my eyes, she thought, and I will dream of nothing.

She had never been a very good liar.

 

.

 

Harry hesitated outside of the Headmaster’s office. She hadn’t been there since she’d trashed it the previous spring, the night when Sirius had died, the night they had heard that terrible prophecy. 

“Right,” she said, and started up the steps. 

“Come in,” Dumbledore said, when she knocked upon the door. 

“Harry,” he said, with the sort of delight one might expect from someone receiving an unexpected visitor. 

“Am I late, sir?” she asked. 

“No, right on time,” he said. “Right on time.”

Harry still felt tired and shaken from the night before. Snape was as exacting and relentless as she’d remembered. Her head felt battered and bruised.

“I’m sure you have been wondering what I have planned for us,” Dumbledore said. 

“Er, just a bit,” she said. 

“I think it’s time for you to know a little bit more about Tom Riddle,” he said. 

Harry shivered at the name. It had been a long time since she had thought about the boy from the diary, tall and pale, his hand on her cheek,  _ You believe me, don’t you Harry? _

“Tom Riddle, sir,” she said. 

“Indeed.”

“Is this about the prophecy?” she asked.

_ (and either must die at the hand of the other for neither can live while the other survives… the one to...) _

“Yes, I think that it has a great deal to do with the prophecy,” he said, solemnly.

He stood up suddenly from his desk, walking around towards her. 

“A great burden has been placed upon your shoulders, my dear,” he said. “We must try to understand it as best we can.”

“Alright,” she said. “Alright, what do I have to know?”

 

.

 

“Who is she?” Harry asked. 

In the memory, two men were arguing, but Harry’s gaze was focused on the girl in the corner, drab and unassuming, afraid, Harry knew, could feel it bone-deep in her marrow. 

Dumbledore’s eyes were sad. “I see you caught on our reason for our visit to this memory.” 

“ _ Is it true?”  _ Gaunt said. “ _ My daughter? A pure-blooded descendant of Salazar Slytherin hankering after some Muggle?” _

Gaunt’s hands wrapped around the girl’s throat and Harry cried out. 

 

.

 

Harry couldn’t get the image of Merope Gaunt out of her head, even days later: the way she had flinched away from her father, the fumbling way she had used her wand, ill-practiced and anxious, the flinty nervous way that she had looked up when Tom Riddle had ridden by. Voldemort’s mother. 

_ “I suspect that she, besotted as she was, came to believe that he loved her in return.”  _

It was a sadder story than Harry would have imagined for Voldemort’s family, and unbidden a wave of sympathy washed over her. How could she not pity someone who came from such squalor and heartbreak? 

 

.

 

“I nearly lost the fourth one,” Ron was saying. “It was a tricky shot from Demelza, but honestly…” 

Harry ran a hand through her hair. Tryouts had been long and grueling. Nearly the entire school had come out in droves, crowding into the stands in order to get a look at her. It made her skin crawl. It had  been this way ever since the start of term: eyes following her wherever she went. It was so the opposite of how everyone had treated her last year, skirting around her as if she were some sort of leper, whispering behind her back. 

“Alright, Harry?” Ron asked, breaking from his rant on his flying prowess to peer down at her. 

“Yeah, of course,” she said, making a greater effort to smile. “Though I was worried for a minute that I was going to have to put McLaggen on the team, and lord knows--”

“McLaggen?” Ron cried, offended. “Blimey, what a mess that would have been. He’d have spent the whole season staring at your arse, I imagine, wouldn’t have blocked a single goal.”

“Oh, shove it,” Harry said, but not without affection. 

Ron threw an arm around her shoulders. “We’ll always have Quidditch,” he said. 

Harry laughed. “Yeah, we’ll always have Quidditch.” 

 

.

 

As they were entering the Great Hall, Slughorn halted them. 

“Harry, Miss Granger, I hope you will do me the honor of attending my little gathering tonight.”

_ Slug Club,  _ Harry mouthed to Hermione. The other girl tried not to giggle. 

“Of course, Professor,” Hermione said. “We wouldn’t miss it.” 

“Excellent, excellent,” he said. It seemed, to Harry, as if he were trying to contain himself from rubbing his hands together. “I shall see you two there.”

“And what am I, chopped liver?” Ron asked, testily, once Slughorn was gone. 

“Oh, Ron, I’m sure he didn’t mean it like that.”

“Besides, imagine, a night in with McLaggen and Zabini,” Harry said. 

“You’re right,” Ron said, seeming to cheer. “Mainly I just feel sorry for you, really.”

 

.

 

“Harry, so glad you could make it,” Slughorn said, shepherding Harry and Hermione into the room. “And Miss Granger, always a pleasure.” 

When Snape had been Potions teacher, his rooms had seemed dreary and depressing, draped in shadows, but under Slughorn’s direction they seemed almost…cozy. Everywhere there was soft things, brocaded fabric, plush pillows, and pictures covering every surface, smiling and waving genially. Harry found it deeply disconcerting. 

“Oh crap, it’s McLaggen,” Harry said. “Hide me.”

“Oh, Harry honestly,” Hermione said. 

“Well, admittedly, I’m not the one who Confounded him earlier,” Harry said, grinning.“So maybe I should be hiding you.”

Hermione blushed. “Shove it, Potter,” she said, sniffily. 

“Potter,” Zabini called. “Are you coming to sit by me?” 

“In your dreams, Zabini,” Harry said. 

“Oh you are,” he said. His smile was downright sinful. 

It was looking like the lesser of two evils, Harry thought, pulling Hermione over to the end of the table. 

“No hard feelings, eh McLaggen?” she said.

The bulky Gryffindor smiled at her, which Harry thought, privately, was almost worse than if he’d been miffed. 

“Oh, not towards you, Potter,” he said. “Of course I don’t know what came over me. It was all some sort of terrible fluke.”

Harry elbowed Hermione in the ribs. 

“Well there’s always next year,” she said. 

“Oh, I’m so glad you two are getting acquainted,” Slughorn said, looking between McLaggen and Harry with an innuendo that Harry thought was a bit overdone. She could see Zabini grinning about it in her periphery. He raised his glass towards her. 

She wondered if there was a discreet way to shoot him the bird without Slughorn noticing. 

“McLaggen, why don’t you tell Potter about your holiday in Romania,” Slughorn said. “You tell the story so well.” 

“Well, it all started…”

  
  


.

 

“Heard tryouts were a smash hit,” Malfoy said, chopping the boomslang skin and passing it to Harry to stir into the cauldron. It irritated her that his knifework was much better than her own. 

“Hmmm, yeah,” Harry said. “A lot of Quidditch hopefuls.” It was still wildly bizarre for her to be small talking with Malfoy of all people.

“I don’t think it was Quidditch they were hopeful about,” he said. 

She shot him a glare. 

“Touchy,” he said. 

It was true that a lot of the people who had shown up to tryouts had no intention of actually trying out for the team. A large number of them hadn’t even been Gryffindors and five separate boys had asked her out after tryouts were over, none of whom she’d ever even spoken to before.

“Just pass the porcupine quills,” she said. 

 

.

 

During the next couple of weeks, Dumbledore was often gone from the school. Harry had grown used to looking up at the dias and seeing the Headmaster’s chair empty. He hadn’t mentioned when their next lesson would be during their first and he never sent for her. It seemed, at least to Harry, as if his view of inclusion was rather limited. It felt, not unlike last year, when he had always been avoiding her, though Hermione tried to convince her that they weren’t the same thing. 

“He must be terribly busy fighting against Voldemort,” Hermione said.

“I thought that was my job,” Harry said, and the other girl had shot her a look.

Still, she couldn’t bring herself to fret about it. Even just the thought of the lessons caused an anxious bubble in her chest.

She hadn’t forgotten the Gaunt house. The way it had felt almost familiar, as if she had seen it before. The hissing curl of Marvolo Gaunt’s voice. Tom Riddle Sr.’s face, the just slightly wrong look of it.

I know you, she thought. I know you. 

 

.

 

“You’re going to wear a hole in it,” Hermione told her. 

Harry was fiddling with the edge of her sweater, unraveling the threads. She forced her hand to still.

“Have you thought any more about starting up the DA again?” Hermione said. 

Harry hadn’t. 

“Do you think we need it?” she asked. “I mean Umbridge is gone now.”

Hermione looked at her for a long, uncomfortable moment. Harry ducked her head. 

“I think you need it,” Hermione said.

“I don’t know if I have time, Hermione,” she said. “What with Quidditch and OWLS and Occlumency with Snape.” 

“Okay,” Hermione said. “Just think about it, though.”

 

.

 

The thing was, Harry knew that she was right. She was doing horribly in Defence, for the first time ever.

“I’d heard you were something of a prodigy, Potter,” Snape had told her. “It appears the masses were… mistaken.” 

She just couldn’t seem to focus. Everytime she did, she thought back to that night at the ministry. The helplessness she had felt staring into Voldemort’s eyes, the fear. It was paralyzing her. 

Her Occlumency lessons were going just as poorly. While she didn’t believe Snape had ever had a particularly high opinion of her -- he had, from the start, been casually dismissive of her both as a student and as a person -- she now thought that he thought her something of a simpleton.

“Is this the best you have?” he had snarled in their last lesson. “A child could tear through these defences.”

He was right, she knew. But she couldn’t bring herself to care.

She wasn’t sleeping either, couldn’t, in fact, remember the last time she had slept a full night. She was scared of what she would see if she closed her eyes. She hadn’t felt  _ him, _ not clearly, since that night right at the start of term, but he was always hovering, a poltergeist in her periphery.

Her letters to Remus were almost always about Quidditch, the only thing she felt as if she could say she was honestly enjoying. Despite her reservations, she found that she liked being Captain. She liked teaching, in any form, but she did miss the DA, the certainty of purpose she had felt when she was doing it, like she was doing something, anything to move herself forward in the fight against  _ him.  _

“Alright,” she told Hermione a couple of days later, after she had mulled it all over. “Alright, let’s do it.”  

 

.

 

“I think it’s a lovely idea, Potter,” McGonagall said. “Though I appreciate you running it by me first.” 

Harry shuffled her feet. “I wanted it to be open to everyone. Everyone who wants to learn more about how to defend themselves that is.”

“And I’m sure many will take you up on the offer,” she said. “These are hard times, Potter, it’s good of you to spread some good feeling.” 

Harry felt a little as she had the first time she had ever sat in McGonagall's office, stunned by the older woman’s sudden praise of her. She was not a woman easily impressed.

“Thank you, Professor,” she said. 

“I must say, however, that Professor Snape has shared with me some concerns with your own performance in his class,” McGonagall said, observing Harry over her spectacles. “Forgive me, Potter, but I rather hope it’s distaste for the man and not the subject.”

A thread of her blazer was coming undone and she tugged on it, wrapping the strand around her finger and pulling. “I’ll get my grade up, Professor,” she said, softly.

“My concern, Potter, is not for the grade,” McGonagall said. “But for you.” 

Harry looked up at her. 

“I--,” Harry started.

“You don’t have to say anything, Miss Potter. I understand the inordinate amount of pressure you’re under. I simply hope that you know you’re not alone in this.”

Harry felt herself, almost against her will, going a little misty eyed.

“Professor--”

“Oh tosh, don’t say anything. Just have a cup of tea and a biscuit and you can be on your way,” she said. 

 

.

 

“I swear if one more boy asks me to go to Hogsmeade with him, I’m going to hex someone,” Harry said, grumpily. 

“Poor, girl,” Ron said, patting her on the back.

“I’m this close to not even going,” Harry said. 

“You shouldn’t let boys dictate your life, Harry,” Hermione said, buttering her toast. 

Zabini dropped into the seat next to Harry and Harry groaned. 

“You coming?” he asked.

Harry sighed, turning to face him. “Coming where?”

“To Hogsmeade with me, of course,” he said, grinning.

“Fuck off, Zabini.”

He grinned, swinging his legs out from under the bench. “Always a pleasure, Potter.”

Harry dropped her head into her hands. “I hate everything,” she said. 

 

.

 

Still, once they were out of the castle, Harry did feel better. It was bitterly cold, the ground already covered in snow, though it was only midway through October, but she was outside, and Ron and Hermione were bickering as they always were, and everything felt, at least momentarily, blessedly normal.

“Broomsticks?” Ron asked. And when the two nodded their ascent they all ducked in. 

It was ridiculously warm and inviting inside and they shed their snowy jackets, locating a booth in the back. 

“I’ll grab drinks,” Harry said, worming through the crowd towards the bar. 

She had been standing at the bar for several minutes trying to grab the attention of the bartender, before she realized who was standing next to her, leaning against the bar and observing her. 

It was strange to see Malfoy out of uniform, though she supposed he mustn’t live in it. Still, there was something almost distressing about seeing Draco Malfoy in  _ jeans _ .

“See something you like,” he said, raising an eyebrow.

She blushed. “No,” she said, quickly. 

“Rosmerta,” he said, calling her over. “Four butterbeers.” 

Rosmerta nodded, pouring the tap and then pushing them over to Draco. He slid three over to her.

“What?” she said. 

“Was that not what you were going to order?” he asked.

She just stared at him. 

“You going to invite me to sit with you?”

“Why would I do that?” she asked. 

He shrugged. “Don’t say I haven’t ever done anything nice for you.” 

Then he was pushing off the bar with his drink and headed over to a table where Harry could see Parkinson, Zabini and Greengrass waiting for him. She stared after him for a moment and then gathered her drinks and returned to the table.

 

.

 

After, she and Ron and Hermione wandered over to Honeydukes. The place was packed with students, one of the only warm spots in the snowy town.

“Oh, Harry,” Hermione said. “You have to come with me to the next one.” 

Harry hadn’t attended a Slug Club meeting since the second week of school. She found them exhausting. Something about Slughorn’s constant attention and Blaise Zabini’s watchful eyes. And McLaggen didn’t help any either. Harry had been purposefully scheduling Quidditch practices whenever she received an invitation, which served the dual purpose of getting her out of them and distracting Ron, who she knew, secretly hated that he had not been invited. 

“Well, I can’t go to the next one,” Harry said, surveying the shelf full of Honeyduke’s chocolate. “Dumbledore’s finally gotten back to me about our next lesson.”

“Has he really?”

“Hmmm.”

“Do you think you’re going chronologically?” Hermione asked. “So the next one will be something from You-Know-Who’s childhood?”

Harry couldn’t really imagine Voldemort as a child. Even when she’d met him as Tom, he hadn’t seemed  _ young.  _ There had been something old to him, even at sixteen. The same age, Harry herself was now.

“I guess I’ll find out on Monday,” she said. 

“Alright,” Hermione said. “And you’re still feeling alright about doing the DA this week?” 

“I said that I was,” Harry said, tiredly. 

She looked out the window. She could still see Malfoy talking to Zabini. Zabini laughed at something he said, the sort of loud laughter that was almost embarrassing. 

“Are you sure you’re alright, Harry?” Hermione asked. 

“I’m fine,” she said. 

 

.

 

Tom Riddle, at eleven, was a handsome boy, tall for his age and severe, self-possessed some might say. An orphan, like she was. There was something off about him, though, something that she couldn’t quite place.  _ There's talent, oh my goodness, yes — and a thirst to prove yourself _ _. _

“Was my father a wizard then?” he asked Dumbledore. 

Dumbledore regarded the small boy. This was a different Dumbledore than the one Harry knew, There was not the familiar kindness in his eyes. 

“I couldn’t tell you that, Tom,” he said. 

“My mother can’t have been magic though,” he said, almost as if to himself. “Or else she wouldn’t have died.”

Hungry, Harry realized, that was the feeling she couldn’t place.  He looked hungry.

 

.

 

“What did you think of Tom Riddle?” Dumbledore asked her. 

“He seemed,” she looked for a moment for the right word. “Lonely, sir.”

“Lonely?” Dumbledore said, and she could see she had surprised him. “Perhaps. Though I do not believe he would ever have described himself that way.”

“And he scared me,” she said. “Even then.”

“Yes,” Dumbledore said. “Even then Tom Riddle had a penchant for cruelty.” 

It was strange, Harry thought, for she knew that the boy would grow to be Voldemort, but she still had the insane desire to ask what had become of him. It was the first time she could remember thinking that magic made things worse. She did not want to look at this sad, abandoned eleven-year-old boy destined only for horror. 

“Sir,” she said.

“Yes, Harry?”

“Why are we doing this? I don’t-- I don’t understand.”

Dumbledore was silent for a long time. 

“All will reveal itself in due time, my dear.”

She wanted to ask him to spell it out for her now, for him to explain it all; but she had the feeling that even if she asked, he would not tell her. 

 

.

 

It was late when she finally left Dumbledore’s office, the torches casting flickering shadows on the stone floor, her mind on Tom Riddle, eleven years old, and as in love with magic as Harry had been at that age.

What had he looked like, she wondered, upon beholding Diagon Alley for the first time, upon seeing the hectic, manic rush of magic on that bright street? How had he felt as he watched the Hogwarts towers rise out of the mist of the lake? Surely, he must have loved it as Harry did. 

_ I can make them hurt if I want,  _ he’d said, and she’d felt a shiver run down her spine. And yet, how many times had Harry herself wished pain upon Dudley, his meaty hands on her wrist,  or upon Vernon and Petunia for locking her away. She had wanted them to hurt too. 

We are not the same, she told herself. 

But she thought of that orphanage, the dull, enclosing walls, and of her cupboard, a cage with a different name, and she couldn’t help but wonder. 

“Potter,” she heard, and she looked up and saw Draco Malfoy peering down at her. “What are you doing out this late?” 

“Don’t dock points, I’m too tired, Malfoy,” she said, “My meeting with Dumbledore ran late, you can take it up with him.”

He put up his hands. “I wasn’t going to take points anyway.”

“Why not?” she said. “I thought that was your favorite thing. Besides trash talking your inferiors, of course.” 

“Is that really what you think of me?” he said, sounding amused. 

“Yes,” she said, trying to edge around him to continue down the hallway.

He blocked her path.“Woah, Potter, you don’t look so good,” he said. 

“Thanks,” she said.

“I’m serious,” he said. “When’s the last time you’ve eaten?”

Breakfast, she thought, or maybe that had been yesterday. 

“I’m fine, Malfoy, honestly, and since when did you care?” she tried to push past him, but she stumbled, off-center.

She really didn’t feel well. Sleep, she just needed to sleep. Sleep without thinking of  _ him. _

“Come on,” he said. 

She felt him loop an arm around her waist and then he was leading her. He smelled nice, she thought, like fresh laundry and something sharp and distinctly boy-ish. 

He deposited her on a bench in the kitchen. 

“Make her something,” he said to an elf. And then he was pushing a bowl of soup towards her. “Eat.” 

She did, working on auto-pilot. Spoon to mouth, spoon to mouth. 

“What’s got you spooked, huh?” he said, sitting down across from her. 

Tom Riddle, age eleven, the way his face had looked lit by firelight, torn between fear and wonderment. 

“Why are you talking to me?” she said. 

“Maybe I like talking to you,” he said, softly. It was a good line, Harry thought, coupled with the way his hair fell nicely across his forehead, and the look in his eyes, just the right amount of vulnerable.

“I don’t believe you,” she said.

He sighed. “I know you don’t, Potter.”

“You hate me,” she said, wondering why she was continuing the conversation.

“No, I don’t,” he said. “I’ve always sort of admired you, actually.” 

Harry wanted to laugh, but he said it so seriously. 

“Come on, Potter,” he said. “I’ll walk you back.”

 

.

 

“Potter, hey, wait up. Harry.” 

A panting Daphne Greengrass emerged around the corner, stopping when she reached Harry. She was the type of girl that had always made Harry slightly uncomfortable. There was something too pristine about her, pretty blonde hair perfectly in place. This was the sort of girl who Draco Malfoy would talk to with soft eyes in the kitchen at night.

“What do you want, Greengrass?” Harry asked. 

“Your meeting is tonight, right?” she asked. “For the Defence thing?”

“Yes?” Harry said. 

“Okay, great,” she said, rocking forward on the balls of her feet.

“Was that all?” Harry asked.

“Look,” she said. “I just wanted to say: we’re not our parents, okay? I know you think that-- well, whatever, but we’re not all bad. You’ll see.”

“Is this about Malfoy?” she asked. 

Daphne just grinned. “See you tonight Harry!” 

Harry sighed, running a hand through her hair.

“Bloody hell,” she said. 

 

.

 

It felt like the Great Hall was crammed full of people. 

“It’s not  _ that  _ many,” Ron said, helpfully. “Just most of the school, give or take.” 

“Are you okay to do this, Harry?” Hermione said.

_ No,  _ Harry thought.

Tom Riddle, age eleven,  _ I knew I was special, I just knew-- _

“Let’s go,” she said. 

She thought maybe the room might quiet when she entered, but it was, after all, simply a room full of raucous children. 

“Hey,” Ginny yelled, giving Harry a thumbs up when the group quieted down.

“So, um,” Harry started. “Some of you have come because you want me to talk about what happened last spring at the Ministry, about seeing Voldemort,” here, there was a vague shudder from the crowd, “what it felt like to be in his presence. You want me to talk about the rumors calling me the Chosen One or some other sort of nonsense. But that’s not what this group is meant to be about.”

Harry could see Malfoy standing with Zabini and Greengrass in the back. He met her gaze.

“Some of you were part of Dumbledore’s Army last year, part of the resistance. It’s good to see you back. We’re allowed to meet openly now, to express our desires to learn about how to protect ourselves without fear of repercussions from the administration. Thank god. But the truth is the real enemy was never Umbridge, the real enemy is,” Tom Riddle, age eleven,  _ I’m not mad, I--  _ , “is still out there. These lessons, whether we like it or not, are life and death. And if you don’t take it seriously, I’d like you to leave. Otherwise pair up: we’re going over the basics of stunning tonight.” 

 

.

 

“Good lesson,” Draco said. 

The hall was finally clearing out. More had stayed than Harry had thought would and it had taken her a long time to move through all the pairs, correcting posture and wand movements, but at the end of the night, she had felt satisfied. It was good work.

“Was that a compliment?” she asked.

“Don’t get used to it,” he said. 

“Hmmm,” she said, watching Ron and Hermione shepherd a pair of second years out the door. 

“You know that stunning isn’t going to help in the real world though, don’t you?” he said, following her gaze.

“It’s helped me,” she said, honestly. 

“You’re Gryffindor foolishness is going to get you killed one day,” he said.

Tom Riddle, at eleven,  _ What is it you can do? All sorts of things.  _

“Yeah, maybe,” Harry said. “Maybe it will.”


	3. Chapter 3

“I think I’ve got it,” Daphne Greengrass said. She turned to grin at Harry over her shoulder.

It threw Harry off guard. “Yeah, that’s good, Daphne,” she said. “Just, umm, keep practicing, why don’t you?”

Harry moved onto the next pair. Colin Creevey was holding his wand at an alarming angle, and Harry rushed to move it down.

“Thanks, Harry,” he said. “You’re a brilliant teacher.”

Harry wasn’t sure about that, but the lessons were still really well attended. They had already, in the last couple of weeks, gone over stunning, some simple counter jinxs, and shield charms. She was thinking they might even try Patronuses soon. Still, she had a funny feeling watching everyone in the hall practicing, running through the mock movements of a duel. These are children, she thought. And we are about to enter a war.

Across the hall she could see Malfoy watching her. He met her gaze briefly. Harry raised an eyebrow, and he turned back to Zabini to continue practicing. She couldn’t believe the Slytherins had kept coming. But she had said that it was open to anyone and she intended to keep that promise. 

“It’s going well, don’t you think?” Hermione said, at her elbow. 

“Yeah,” Harry said, looking again at where Zabini and Malfoy were dueling. “Yeah, I think so.”

 

.

 

“Again,” Snape said. 

Harry pushed a hand through her hair. She was sweating and her head ached, but she knew better than to say anything to Snape. 

“ _ Legimens,”  _ he said. 

The sloping walls of her cupboard, Sirius ruffling her hair,  _ come on, kid, you’ve always got a home with me, _ Voldemort in the Ministry, his eyes blown wide, Bellatrix, laughing, Umbridge, staring down at her, Vernon’s fist and and and 

“Stop,” she said, panting. “Stop.”

“The Dark Lord won’t stop.” 

But he has, Harry thought. She hadn’t felt anything from him for months. 

“What’s even worth knowing in my head?” Harry said. “No one tells me anything.” 

“Dumbledore has trusted you with secrets few could even dream--”

Tom Riddle, age eleven,  _ I think there’s something in that cupboard, Tom.  _

“Yeah. Right,” Harry said.

“Again,” Snape said. 

And Harry steeled herself.

 

.

 

“Just ask him,” Harry told Hermione for what felt like the umpteenth time.  “It’s just Ron for fucks sake.” 

“I know, I know,” Hermione said. “I just think--”

“Don’t think, just go,” Harry said, shoving the other girl off towards where Ron was chatting emphatically with Dean about their last Quidditch match.

Slughorn’s big Christmas party was coming up and Harry had no clue who she was going to ask. It was strange, for, in some way that she couldn’t quite understand, she knew that she could ask almost anyone and they would probably say yes. But of course, it wasn’t really  _ Harry  _ they were interested in, and she had no interest in going with someone who was only with her because they thought she was the Chosen One. 

She had no interest really in even being the Chosen One, but like so many things, she hadn’t had a choice in the matter.

Hermione was gesturing broadly with her arms and Ron was blushing. Harry leaned her head against the side of the armchair, feeling the scratch of fabric across her cheek, the wash of fire against her skin. 

_ Are you ever lonely?  _ she thought, and then wondered why she’d phrased it as a question at all.

 

.

 

Recently, Harry’d started flying early in the morning before everyone else was awake. She liked the frosty winter air, the grounds stripped bare of people, the quiet.

But that morning, there was someone already on the pitch when she got there.

They were too far away for Harry to see anything but the blur of their broom across the sky. She stood there for a moment staring, her breath puffing smoke into the air. 

Then the blur came rushing towards her and Harry saw who it was.

“Hello,” Malfoy said, dismounting and running a hand through his hair.

He was the last person Harry had expected to see. 

She stared at him, and then said, “No one’s out this early,” as if that would make it true.

“Yeah,” he said, looking around at the empty stands. “Funnily enough, I gathered that.” 

“Sorry,” Harry said, shifting, suddenly hyper-aware that she was wearing a pair of sweatpants that used to be Dudley’s and two sweaters stacked stupidly on top of each other. “I just like the solitude I guess.”

He furrowed his brow. “Do you want me to leave?” 

Harry was still having trouble meshing this Malfoy, this Malfoy that smiled at her and looked at her with concern in his eyes, with the one she had always known, the boy who had teased and taunted her since she was eleven. 

“No, umm, you don’t have to,” she said. 

“Fancy a game, then?

His grin was charming. Harry was sure that many girls at Hogwarts had fallen prey to that grin. But she liked the idea of a game, even if it was with Malfoy of all people, and so she found herself nodding her head.

“Yeah, okay, let’s play,” she said. 

 

.

 

Harry dismounted the broom, breathless and worn out in a way that felt fucking  _ good _ . Quidditch, since she’d been made Captain, had felt more like a series of trials than a game. It felt good to just play again, really good.

“You’ve been practicing,” she accused. 

“Flying’s a good stress reliever,” he said, shrugging. It was an unexpected thing for him to say,  something they shared. She had always thought that he only took pleasure in beating people. 

“Well, you might actually give us some competition this year.” 

“Oh, fuck off,” he said, nudging her. He was standing close enough to her that she was aware of his every movement. “We’re going to cream you.”

She laughed. “Not bloody likely.”

“Well, we’ll see, won’t we Potter?”

“I suppose we will,” Harry said. His eyes darted to her face and then away and she felt herself blush, and then somehow, without really knowing what she was doing, she was saying, “Are you going to Slughorn’s Christmas party?” 

He raised an eyebrow. “I wasn’t invited,” he said.

“Oh,” she said.

“Were you asking?” There was an irritating smugness to his tone.

“No,” Harry said, automatically.

The quirk of his lips. The quick slice of his eyes to her mouth. “I would go with you if you were.”

“Oh,” Harry said, again.

Something in her expression must have amused him, because he laughed and then slung an arm over her shoulder.

“Come on, Potter,” he said. “I’ll get the house elves to make us breakfast.” 

 

.

 

“Are you going with Draco Malfoy to Slughorn’s party?” Hermione asked, swinging onto the bench beside Harry.

Harry paused with a piece of fish midway to her mouth. 

“Who said that?” she asked. 

“Everyone’s talking about it,” Hermione said, simply. “I heard Padma Patil telling Emily Cline, who said she’d heard it from Raphael Ernedine who’d heard it from Blaise Zabini.”

Harry sighed. “Well, I sort of, er, asked him. Kinda. Not straight out.” 

“You asked Draco Malfoy to Slughorn’s party?  _ Our _ Draco Malfoy?” Ron said, loudly enough that Hermione shushed him. 

Harry shrugged, helpless. “It just kind of slipped out.”

“His father’s a Death Eater,” Ron hissed. 

“It just sort of happened,” Harry insisted. It was something that Harry had been thinking about, in the agonized, embarrassed moments that she recalled asking him. But she had trouble even imagining Malfoy in the same room as the Voldemort. Malfoy was just… Malfoy. 

“I mean it’s not as if the Dark Lord is recruiting children,” Hermione said, reasonably. “But I still don’t think you going with him is a good idea.”

“You were the one that told me he probably fancied me,” Harry said. 

“Yes,” Hermione said. “But I didn’t think you fancied him back.” 

“I don’t,” Harry said, automatically. 

Hermione shot her a look.

“It’s just a party,” Harry said, “Honestly.”

 

.

 

Just a party, Harry thought, was a bit of an understatement. 

“Slughorn’s really outdone himself,” Malfoy said, when they entered Slughorn’s quarters. “Honestly, I don’t think he could possibly have done more.” 

Privately, Harry agreed. The room was a bit… overzealous in its Christmas decor. 

“Luckily for us,” Malfoy said, placing his hand on the small of her back, his hand was cold and Harry shivered. “I brought firewhiskey.” 

“Harry, my dear,” Slughorn said, descending on the two of them. Harry automatically recoiled, bumping into Malfoy. “And Mr. Malfoy. My most promising Potions partners! How delightful!”

Harry forced her face into a smile. “Thanks for inviting me, sir.”

“Of course, of course,” Slughorn said. “Now, there are a couple of people I want you to meet, just a few introductions, everyone is so looking forward to seeing you, the Chosen One and all.”

“Of course,” Harry said.

When Slughorn had turned, she leaned further into Malfoy. “I think I’m going to need that firewhiskey,” she said.

 

.

 

A half hour and several liberal swigs from Malfoy’s flask (“Is that real silver, you posh prick?” Harry had said when she’d seen it), the night was looking up. 

While Slughorn was constantly dogging her, dragging her between one group of fans and the next, at each group Malfoy whispered impersonations, increasingly bad, of all the people Slughorn forcibly introduced her to, which led to several instances of Harry almost choking on her punch, but made, she thought, somewhat surprised, the evening loads more enjoyable. 

“Admit it, Potter,” Malfoy said, now, grinning. “You’re having a good time with me.”

“And how about you?” she challenged. “You haven’t taken your eyes off me.”

His grin spread. “It’s this damn dress,” he said, running his hand up her side, fingering the shiny fabric. Harry shivered. 

“Is it?” she asked. 

“It’s downright sinful, Potter,” he said. “And you know it.”

The dress had been forced on Harry by Hermione and Ginny when they’d gone to Diagon Alley this summer. It was a soft, silver flowing thing that was finer than anything Harry had ever worn before. (“I don’t know guys,” she’d said upon trying it on. “It isn’t very me, is it?” But the two had insisted. And admittedly, the expression on Malfoy’s face when she’d walked into the Great Hall had made it all seem somehow worth it. He’d looked gobsmacked.)

“Oh, Harry, there you are,” Hermione said, appearing at Harry’s elbow, looking nice, if a bit windblown. 

Malfoy stepped back from her and Harry was surprised by the swell of disappointment she felt. 

“Having fun, Hermione?” Harry asked. 

Hermione’s eyes darted to Malfoy and then back to Harry. “I am,” she said. “Ronald and I are going for a walk, I just wanted to check on you before I went.” 

Harry’s eyebrows raised. “A walk?” she asked. 

Hermione looked pleased. “Yes,” she said. 

“Oh,” Harry said. “Well, good luck.”

Hermione darted forward suddenly and pressed a kiss to Harry’s cheek, whispering, “Be careful,” into her ear, before rocking back on her heels and looking at Harry for a moment.

“I’ll wait up for you,” she said, and then turned to go. Harry could see Ron by the door, looking nervous and out-of-place, and she felt a surge of some undefined emotion.

“I never thought Weasley would work up the nerve,” Malfoy said, dryly.

Harry didn’t respond and she could feel his eyes on her face, curious.

“Come on, Potter,” he said. “Have another swig of firewhiskey, things’ll look up.”

When Harry looked up at him, she saw that his expression was strangely soft.

“Yeah, alright,” she said, taking the flask from him.

 

.

 

“It wasn’t funny,” Malfoy insisted, stumbling into her. Harry caught him around the waist. 

“If it was anyone else you would think it was funny,” she said. 

“Well, obviously,” he said. “But it wasn’t anyone else, was it?” 

Harry felt the warm, solid flex of his stomach pressing against her palm. 

It was late in the night, the party past ended, but they were still wandering the hallways (“Won’t we get in trouble?” she’d asked. “Prefect,” he’d said, smugly and she’d shoved him.)

He stopped midway down the hall, dragging Harry to a halt with him.

“What?” she said. 

His gaze was suddenly intense on her face, his hand reaching up, almost hesitant, to cup her cheek. 

“Look,” he said. Harry followed his gaze upwards to where a sprig of mistletoe was twinkling merrily -- a spell all the third years were learning for the holidays -- and she was about to say something about how all the holiday spirit really was overrated anyway and then he was kissing her. 

Last year, when she had kissed Cho it had been nice, if all kinds of sad, but it hadn’t felt  _ special _ . Hermione, true to form, had told Harry that it would simply get better with practice. But when she’d kissed a boy this summer, a nice Muggle boy who’d worked in the shop next to hers, it hadn’t felt any different, not even when he’d swiped his tongue into her mouth. 

But kissing Draco Malfoy felt dangerous. His hand slipped into her hair, tilting her head back to deepen the kiss and Harry’s hand fluttered against his side, before coming up to grip the fabric of his shirt, hard and needy, and that was when she realized that she was kissing him back, that she wanted to be kissing him back. 

He pressed closer to her, opening her mouth with his. 

“Fuck, Harry,” he said into her mouth. 

He tasted like firewhiskey and boy and Harry wanted to keep going, to keep kissing him. But she made herself pull back. 

His eyes were dark on his face, and she thought, sort of dizzily, that she could get used to seeing him in close up like this, blown wide by her. 

“I’m kind of drunk,” she told him. 

“Me too,” he admitted. 

“So I’m going to go to bed,” she said. 

“Probably wise,” he said, but when she backed away, he grabbed her arm and pulled her back in again.

Harry was breathless when he let her go. 

She backed away from him. “I’m going now. No shenanigans,” she said, trying to sound stern.

He raised his hands, not looking at all contrite.

She started backing down the hallway, watching him watch her walk away. 

“Harry,” he said, when she was about to turn the corner.

She stopped. “Yeah?” she asked.

She felt rumpled and star struck and unlike herself. Draco Malfoy, she thought again. What was she doing? 

He looked at her a long time. But then he just ran his hand through his hair and said, “Nevermind.”

 

.

 

Hermione was waiting up for her when she got back to the Common Room. Harry couldn’t imagine what she must look like. 

“You alright?” Hermione said, when Harry stumbled through the portrait hole. 

Harry pushed her hair back from her face. The carefully placed curls that Lavender and Parvati had done for her earlier were coming undone, falling haphazardly into her face. 

“I’m a little bit drunk,” Harry admitted, collapsing into the chair next to Hermione.

“Malfoy got you drunk?” Hermione asked.

Harry sighed. She could already feel the high from the night wearing off. Really, she just wanted to sleep. “It wasn’t like that. You don’t have to worry.” 

“Okay,” she said, not looking convinced. “Here,” she tapped the mug sitting by her feet with her wand and handed it to Harry. “This is for you.”

It was a warm mug of cocoa and Harry wrapped her hands gratefully around it. 

“Thanks,” she said. 

The other girl hummed. 

“Ron kissed me tonight, you know?” she said. 

“Oh?” Harry said. “How was that?” 

Hermione blushed. “It was good,” she said. 

It was quiet for a moment. Harry listened to the crackle of the fire. 

“Did Malfoy kiss you?” Hermione asked. 

“Yeah,” Harry admitted. 

When she turned to look at Hermione, she saw that the other girl was watching her, biting the edge of her lip. 

“Oh, Harry, just be careful,” she said. 

“I will be,” Harry said. “You don’t have to be worried.”

“I always worry about you,” Hermione said. 

“I know,” Harry said. “I know.”

 

.

 

Malfoy’s mouth was hot and slick on the corner of her jaw. 

“I thought you were walking me to lunch,” Harry said, breathless. 

She had the sense that the press of his body against hers could be addicting. He was so  _ warm. _ He bit down on the side of her neck and she arched further into him. 

“I am,” he said. The span of his hands against the small of her back, pressing her closer. The texture of his hair beneath her fingers. “This is just a detour.”

“Dastardly,” she told him. 

“Stop talking,” he told her.

“Make me,” she said. 

He laughed against her skin. “Alright,” he said. 

 

.

 

Ron and Hermione were holding hands when Harry got to lunch. She tried to act like she didn't think it was a big deal. 

“Where’ve you been?” Ron asked, curiously. 

“Got held up,” Harry said, dropping her bag and piling food onto her plate. 

Hermione’s eyes were knowing. Harry wondered if she had a sign on her that said, “was snogging Draco Malfoy in a broom closet”. 

“Hey Harry,” Harry heard at her elbow. 

“Oh, hey Demelza,” she said. “Your knee doing alright?”

“It’s fine,” she said, “This is for you.” She thrust an envelope at Harry, the familiar spidery font sprawled across the front. 

“Another meeting with Dumbledore?” Hermione asked.

“It’s been weeks, hasn’t it?” Ron asked.

It had. Harry had been trying to push the image of young Tom Riddle from her brain, as if if she concentrated hard enough, she could make the whole thing disappear. . 

“What do you think it’s going to be this time?”

“Something from You-Know-Who’s school days, I’d imagine. What do you think Harry?”

She didn’t like to think too much about the boy from the diary.  _ Harry Potter,  _ he’d said. She hadn’t liked the way he’d said her name, like it was revelation.  _ You are a brave one aren’t you? _

“I dunno,” she said. “Suppose I’ll find out tonight.” 

 

.

 

Tom Riddle, age sixteen, was as handsome as Harry remembered him. It was disconcerting, almost. How could someone that beautiful be bad? she thought. Surely--

_ “I thought you were that Muggle,” _ Morfin hissed. 

But there was no question, at least in Harry’s mind, that Tom Riddle was anything anyway related to ordinary. This was a boy without fear -- without a sense of  _ morality,  _ Harry reminded herself. But still there was something impressive about the way he took up space.

_ “What Muggle?”  _ he asked, the curl of his tongue in Parseltongue. He did not speak it at all like Harry did. 

_ “Tom Riddle. He came back, see?” _

If Harry hadn’t been watching Riddle’s face so closely she wouldn’t have seen it, a flicker of emotion. 

_ “Riddle came back?” _ he said. 

 

.

 

“He killed his father,” Harry said. “After this conversation.”

“He did,” Dumbledore said. “That very same day. Having discovered the truth of his heritage, an ordinary muggle family, I believe he flew into a rage and murdered them.”

Harry’s brow furrowed. “But you don’t think it was because they left him?” 

Dumbledore looked surprised. “Do you?” he asked. 

“I mean,” Harry said. “The reason he hated his mother, it was like he said, he couldn’t believe she could be magic because she died, it felt like a betrayal, and then to find out that his only living relative had left him, alone, I mean, it would be pretty crushing, wouldn’t it?”

“You are prescribing the emotions of a rational mind to a lunatic, my dear,” Dumbledore said. “An admirable quality, but ultimately misguided. I do not believe that Tom Riddle ever experienced affection or love, or the emotions that come along with it, sadness, pain, heartbreak.”

“He’s just a boy here though,” Harry said. My age, she thought.

“A boy that murdered a family of Muggles in cold blood,” Dumbledore said, somewhat sternly, and then seemed to catch himself. “Do not feel sorry for Tom Riddle, Harry,” he said.

Was that not the point of these lessons though _ ,  _ Harry thought. But she kept silent.

“I have one more memory for us to watch before the end of term,” Dumbledore said, dropping his good hand onto Harry’s shoulder and steering her toward the Pensieve. “Come, time is running short.”

 

.

 

Slughorn’s quarters looked eerily similar to how they did now, though the faces in the pictures had changed. It was strange to see Tom Riddle there, as though if Harry went down to the dungeons of her own time she could find him, lounging as he was in front of her now, on a chair by the fire. 

The other boys left, but Tom remained behind. When Slughorn turned and saw that he was still there, he gave him a familiar smile, one he had given Harry a hundred times.

“Look sharp, Tom,” he said. “Wouldn’t want you to get caught out of bed after hours, and you a prefect.”

“I’ll go, sir, it’s just,” Riddle leaned forward, his expression sharp, “I wondered if I could ask you something first.”

“Ask away, m’boy, ask away.”

“Sir, I wonder what you know about...Horcruxes.” The word was like a caress.

For a second, Harry caught a glimpse of Slughorn’s startled face, and then the fog descended.

 

.

“I’d like you obtain the rest of the memory from Slughorn, if you can,” Dumbledore said. “I believe it to be the last piece in an extraordinarily complicated puzzle.” 

“But surely, sir, you don’t need me to get the rest of the memory,” she said. She couldn’t comprehend what the puzzle even was, much less what piece was missing. “Perhaps if you asked him…?”

“Oh, I’m quite sure he won’t give it to me,” Dumbledore said. “Consider it homework, something to ponder over the break.”

There was something in his tone that read as a dismissal, so Harry gathered her things to go, but she hesitated by the door.

“Sir,” she said.

“Yes, Harry?”

“What is,” she stopped, and then started again. “What is a Horcrux?”

His face shuttered. “A conversation for another day, my dear,” he said.

“Sir--”

“Have a lovely evening, Harry,” he said, in a way that made it clear that the subject was closed. “And safe travels over the break. I ask you simply to think on what I’ve asked of you.” 

“Alright,” she said, awkwardly backing out of the room. But she looked once more at the Pensieve as exited.

She did not think she would soon forget sixteen-year-old Tom Riddle, the way his voice had wrapped around  _ that  _ word, the same way he had said her name four years ago.

Horcrux. 

 

.

 

“Potter, hey wait up.”

Harry turned and saw Blaise Zabini jogging towards her.

“I don’t have a lot of time, I’m headed to the Floo,” she told him.

“I know,” he said, running a hand through his curls. There was something about the way he did it that irritated her. He knew he looked good, she thought, he didn’t have to rub it in.

“Well?” she said. “You had something to say.”

“Right, right,” he said. “Malfoy’s already gone, but he asked me to give you this.”

Harry’s brow wrinkled, but she took the note from him.

Zabini didn’t leave. 

“No goodbye kiss?” he asked. “Or is that just for Malfoy?”

“Fuck off, Zabini,” she said, and he grinned. 

“See you around, Potter. Happy Christmas.”

“Yeah, yeah, Happy Christmas,” she said. “Shoo.”

Harry unfolded the note once he was gone. It was short and to the point. 

_ Potter _ , it read,  _ Don’t write me over holiday, I’ll explain later. DM. _

As if she’d been planning on writing him. It wasn’t as if they were dating.  _ Were  _ they dating? Merlin, there was a reason she normally stayed far away from these things. The mess with Cho had been enough.

Still, she pocketed the note.

Draco Malfoy, she thought again, shaking her head. What was she thinking?

 

.

 

It was snowing outside the Burrow, dusting everything with a fine layer of white -- the trees, the house, the small pond, even the stupid garden gnomes looked like Christmas.

“Horcruxes?” Hermione was saying. “Oh, I’ve never heard of them. They must be terribly dark magic if Voldemort wanted to know about them.” 

“I think he knew what they were,” Harry said. “It was just that he wanted more information on them.”

“What makes you think that?” Ron asked.

“Just something in his tone,” Harry said. She tucked her feet under her, suddenly cold, though she was wearing one of Fred’s old sweaters and a pair of thick socks. 

Hermione seemed to catch onto Harry’s train of thought. “Is it strange?” she asked. “To see him as Tom Riddle I mean, not as Voldemort.” 

“Yeah,” Harry said, honestly. “It’s super fucking weird, alright.”

“There must be a reason why Dumbledore wants you to go through these memories though.”

“Know your enemy?” Ron said. 

“Yeah, I don’t know, maybe,” Harry said. 

She didn’t know how to vocalize how much she didn’t want to know Tom Riddle, how much harder it made it all. It was easier, she thought, for him to simply be a monster. You could kill a monster. How did you kill a man? 

_ (The one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord… and he will know her as his equal… and and and…) _

“What comes next though?” Hermione asked.

“Well,” Harry said. “I suppose we start by figuring out what a Horcrux is.”

 

_. _

 

It was Christmas Eve and Harry was curled in an armchair in the corner of the Burrow, watching Mrs. Weasley and Fleur fight about the Christmas decorations. Fleur had put her foot  down so firmly that Harry was sure she was going to fit right in (“I vill not stay in a house with zis kind of atrocity,” she’d said, aggressively brandishing what Harry had to agree was a particularly ugly Christmas elf, to which Mrs. Weasley had exclaimed, “Generations of Weasleys have put up this elf!” and so on). It was a comfortable squabbling. Family. 

Remus put his hand on her shoulder.

“How are you holding up?” he asked her.

“I’m… holding up,” she said.

“Ah,” he said. “I haven’t written enough.” 

“You’ve been fine,” Harry said. And he had, it was her that was out of sorts.

“I’ve been undercover,” he said. “It makes writing difficult. But I promise you, sweetheart, I’m here for you.”

“I know,” she said, and she did. It just wasn’t enough. But she knew that that would sadden him and it was Christmas, the type of Christmas she could only have dreamed of as a child, and so she simply let herself lean into the warmth of him. 

“Happy Christmas,” he said, pressing a kiss to the top of her head. 

“Happy Christmas,” she reiterated. 

 

.

 

“Blimey, Hermione,” Ron said. “You’re bloody brilliant, you are.”

She had gotten him a dueling chess set, one that practiced all sorts of complicated maneuvers. Hermione blushed, but looked beyond pleased when he leaned over and pressed a kiss to her cheek. 

“Get a room,” Harry said. 

“Oi,” Ron said. “Open yours next, you git.” 

“Yeah, yeah,” Harry said, rummaging through her packages.

There was one near the bottom that was written in an semi-familiar hand, so she flipped the card open. 

_ Potter,  _ it read,  _ Don’t freak out or jump to any such Gryffindor conclusions, I’m not expecting you to put my picture inside or anything, I just saw it and thought of you. Happy Christmas. DM _

It was a locket, simply but finely crafted. Harry lifted it carefully from the box, sort of afraid it was going to leap out and bite her.

“Blimey, that’s nice,” Ron said. “Who’s it from anyway?”

“Malfoy,” Harry said. 

Hermione’s eyebrows raised.

“This is insane, right?” Harry said. “It’s not even like we’re together.”

“It sure seems like he thinks you are,” Ron said. “Merlin, he’s a prat.”

“He must have bought it ages ago,” Hermione said. Before we’d even kissed, Harry thought, before I’d even asked him to Slughorn’s party. 

“Do you think I should wear it?” she asked, trying to pry apart the little chamber, but it held fast.

“Well, it’s not cursed or anything,” Hermione said. “All your mail is checked.”

“It’s not like a statement that I’m his property or anything, is it? Some sort of pureblood propaganda?” she asked, eyeing the necklace dubiously.

“It’s just a necklace,” Ron said, throwing himself back on the bed.

“Do you like it?” Hermione asked. “I suppose that’s the only thing that matters.” 

“Yeah,” Harry said, and she did. A surprising amount. “It’s beautiful.”

“Well, then,” she said. “Wear it.”

 

.

 

Later though, when she and Hermione were going for a walk around the grounds of the Burrow, Hermione turned to her, “Have you talked to Malfoy about anything?”

“Anything what?” Harry said, cautiously. 

“I mean, you know I don’t think he’s a Death Eater,” Hermione said, pushing her hair out of her face. “Not yet anyway.  But that doesn’t mean he doesn’t support the cause. If you’re going to trust him, you need to find out whose side he’s on.”

Did she trust him? Harry didn’t know. Not like she trusted Hermione or Ron or Ginny, or even Luna or Neville, but enough, she supposed, to laugh with him, to kiss him even. What did that mean? Where exactly did that leave them?

“Why would he try and be my friend if he wasn’t on our side?” Harry asked. 

“I don’t know,” Hermione said. “But there are a lot of reasons he could want to be close to you.”

Harry thought about his eyes in the kitchen, the way he’d said,  _ I’ve always sort of admired you.  _

“I don’t think he’s a threat, Hermione,” Harry said, seriously. “He’s just, I don’t know, he’s just a boy.”

“Voldemort was a boy once, too,” Hermione said, simply, and then they didn’t say anything more about it. 

 

.

 

“How are you doing?” Ginny asked her.

Harry looked out the window. Ron and Hermione were playing outside, throwing snow, laughing.

“Not you too, Gin,” Harry said.

“I know, I know, it doesn’t help,” Ginny said. She came to sit next to Harry, nudging her with her knee. “But I’ve been watching you, I know you’re not okay.” 

Harry fidgeted with the fringe of the old tartan blanket. 

“You know if you ever want to talk about him, about Tom, you can talk to me, right?” 

When Harry looked up, Ginny was watching her with steady eyes.

“I forget you knew him too,” Harry said, awkwardly.

“I know you do,” Ginny said. 

“They don’t feel like the same person,” Harry said. Tom Riddle, he had looked  _ wounded.  _

“But they are,” Ginny said, seriously. “That’s the scary thing.”

“Something happened to him,” Harry said, not sure why she was pushing the point. “To make him that  _ thing _ .”

Ginny shook her head, the shiny fall of her hair. They were so similar, she and Ginny, so different. “No,” Ginny said. “He was always that thing.”

Harry wanted to tell Ginny about the boy in the orphanage, the box of stolen things, and that strange hunger on Tom Riddle’s face, how often she had seen the same expression in the mirror, but she didn’t have the words, or maybe it was that she didn’t have the will to voice them.

Perhaps the hat was right, Harry thought, perhaps I never did belong in Gryffindor.

 

.

 

It was Christmas Day and the Minister of Magic was standing in the doorway to the Burrow. It seemed ludicrous, but there it was.

“Miss Potter,” he said, inclining his head towards her. “I’d like a word, if you wouldn’t mind.”

By the sink, Mrs. Weasley was clutching an irritated looking Percy to her as if she could force him back into the family with the strength of her affection. 

“Harry,” Remus said, putting a hand on her shoulder, but she was already standing. 

“Alright,” she said. 

They walked in silence for a moment around the house. 

It was bitterly cold outside and already Harry could feel the snow melting into her hair. It would be a frizzy mess later. 

She crossed her arms, tucking her hands into her armpits. “What do you want?” she said. 

Scrimgeour looked surprised, and he halted where they stood by the pond.

“I’m not really one for beating around the bush,” Harry said. “You want something.”

“People are scared,” he started.

“They should be,” Harry said.

Scrimgeour looked uncomfortable at her response, which gave Harry a strange surge of pleasure, but he continued on, “They could use someone to give them spirit, to tell them that everything’s okay.”

“But things aren’t okay,” she said, surprised somehow at her own candor. She had never liked politicians. “Are they?”

“No, I suppose you know that they aren’t,” he said, looking at her thoughtfully.

Harry turned from him, and they continued walking around the house.

“Really, it’s all about perception, Harry,” Scrimgeour said, finally.‘The Chosen One’ and all that, it’s all about giving people hope.”

“No,” Harry said. “That’s not what it’s about at all.” 

 

.

 

“They’re almost sickening aren’t they?” George said, dropping into the seat next to Harry.

He nodded his head towards where Ron and Hermione were talking on the couch.

“New love,” Fred agreed from the other side of her. “Revolting.”

“Oh, so you only like the bottled version is that what you’re saying?” Harry asked.

“Don’t need it,” Fred said. “Plenty capable of procuring it on my own.” 

“Yeah right,” Ginny said. “Shove over, I want to watch.”

“This isn’t a show,” Ron called from the couch.

“As the only one with someone to kiss on New Years you can shove it,” Ginny said, leaning back against Harry’s arm.

Harry found herself thinking, almost involuntarily of Malfoy. “What’s Dean doing for break?” she asked Ginny.

“His mum’s taken him to Wales,” Ginny said. “Normally he lives in London, but apparently his mum’s gone batshit, something about London not being safe anymore.”

Harry frowned. “Not safe?” she asked. “Because of Voldemort?” 

Ginny shook her head. “Muggle terrorist attacks, or something. Fuck if I know, really. I’ve always been shit at Muggle politics.”

“Huh,” she said.

Harry’s watch ticked down the seconds to midnight. What would the new year bring, she wondered. 

Nothing good, she sensed. 

 

.

 

Harry couldn’t sleep.

After the festivities, Ron had collapsed immediately in bed and passed out, but Harry still felt uneasy.

Though she’d spent countless nights just like this one at the Burrow, listening to the wind through the eaves, the soft sound of Ron snoring from the bed, tonight, it did not bring her the calm that it usually did. 

Something was calling to her. 

She padded out of the room, down the three flights of stairs and out into the night. It was cold and clear and Harry could feel the air deep in her lungs. 

Something was calling to her.

Snape claimed that her walls weren’t substantial enough to maintain an actual assault (“I suppose I should consider it a victory that you’re not actively blasting your thoughts anymore,” he’d sneered recently), but she still hadn’t felt  _ him  _ since that night at the start of term.

It was almost strange.

She felt… curious. 

Something, something was calling to her.

Tentatively, she lowered the wall, pressed a hand against the bridge between them.

For a moment, nothing. 

And then suddenly, he was there. So present she felt almost as if she could touch him. She gasped into the cold. 

He was the tips of her fingertips, the too heavy thud of her heart, the spasm of her hands. 

_ Hello,  _ he said. His smile was the buzz of her skin.

How had she ever imagined herself free of him?

She couldn’t keep her thoughts straight -- Merope Gaunt, flinching in the corner, Tom Riddle, age eleven, the wonder on his face upon seeing magic for the first time, Tom Riddle, age sixteen, the lazy way he had worn Gaunt’s ring. 

_ Horcruxes. _

_ What’s Dumbledore been putting in your head, huh?  _ he asked her, warm,  _ amused _ .

_ What’s a Horcrux?  _ she asked him. 

She tried to push into him, but he was only what he showed her of him. The spread of his amusement, the weight of her own body. 

_ Oh, pet,  _ he said,  _ How much the old man has kept from you.  _

_ Tell me,  _ Harry said, pushing harder against him. 

_ Soon,  _ he said, and then he was gone, only blackness remaining, and Harry was left gasping into the open air. 

 

.

 

“Harry!” 

“Harry!”

Someone was saying her name. She blinked into the night. 

“Harry, there you are.”

An arm going around her shoulder, draping a blanket.

“You’re fucking freezing, mate.”

“Sorry,” Harry said. 

Had she dreamt it? 

_ Soon, _ he’d said.

“What are you doing out here?” 

Hermione and Ron were both peering down at her.  

“I just,” _ had to have a talk with Lord Voldemort, _ “wanted some air,” she said. “Couldn’t sleep.”

“Are you having dreams again?” Hermione asked. 

“No,” Harry said. Her legs ached when she stood. How long had she been sitting there?

“I’m sorry for worrying you,” she said. She was always sorry. 

Hermione pulled her close to her and then after a moment Ron was hugging her too, squeezing her between the two of them. Harry let herself melt into them, let herself believe, for the moment, that she was safe. 

Over her shoulder, she could see her hand, clutching Hermione’s jacket, pale in the darkness,  _ I must not tell lies.  _   
  
  
  



	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> updated tags

“Don’t cry, Mum,” Ginny was saying, patting Mrs. Weasley on the back.

If anything, it seemed to make her cry harder, though she let go of Ginny and turned to Harry, enfolding her in a fierce hug.

“You be careful,” she said, sternly, through the tears. 

“I will,” Harry said, wondering how many times she was going to promise the same thing. It wasn’t as if she went looking for danger. It just found her.

_ Soon _ , he’d said. 

Harry stepped towards the floo, allowing herself one more glance back at the Burrow, the warm kitchen, the gaggle of Weasley’s, and then she disappeared into the fireplace.

 

.

 

“Do you have any ideas about what you’re going to say to Slughorn?” Hermione asked. It wasn’t the first time she’d raised the question. It had been a near constant topic of discussion over the break. 

“Not yet,” Harry said, again. “The keys got to be Horcruxes, though, don’t you think?” She’d said the same thing the first time Hermione asked, and the second, and the third too.

“It’s just that I’ve never even heard mention of them before,” Hermione said.

“You’re sure Dumbledore won’t tell you what they are?” Ron asked. 

Harry thought about the way that Dumbledore’s face had closed when she’d asked. “I’m sure,” she said. 

“Well, we’ll just have to keep looking,” Hermione said. 

“Yeah,” Harry said, looking out at the Hogwarts grounds. “I think I might go for a fly.”

Hermione’s brow furrowed. “In this weather?”

“Just for a bit,” Harry said, rising from her seat by the fire. 

Hermione opened her mouth. 

“If you say be careful I might smack you,” Harry said. 

 

.

 

It was dreadful outside, but Harry was nothing if not stubborn, so she kicked off the frozen ground, careening into the sky. 

Something felt off.

It had been three days since she’d heard him, and he felt, suddenly, in a way that he hadn’t for months and months, present. It was like having an extra arm, a sixth sense. She could feel him and he felt… 

He felt almost  _ happy _ . 

And she knew that whatever was making Voldemort happy meant nothing good for her. 

 

.

 

Harry shrugged out of her coat, shucking snow and muck. She was cold and flying had done little to cheer her.

Something felt off.

“Hey,” someone behind her said. 

She turned and saw that it was Malfoy. He looked as bad as she felt, dark circles pressed under his eyes.

“Bad break?” she asked. 

He ran a hand through his hair. She was beginning to sense it was a nervous tick. How odd that she had begun to notice things about him. “I’ve had better,” he said. 

“Yeah, me too,” she said. It was not like she had forgotten who his father was, what had happened to him. 

“You’re wearing it,” Malfoy said, his eyes shifting to her collarbone where the necklace lay. The expression on his face was odd.

“Yeah,” Harry said, fiddling with the chain. “Umm, it’s beautiful. Thanks.” 

He looked off towards the Great Hall, not saying anything.

Harry shifted her feet. Her trainers looked ragged and drab against the stone floors. She hadn’t yet changed into uniform.

“Sit with me at dinner?” he said, finally. 

“Do I have to sit at the Slytherin table?” she asked. The drag of her toe.

“I promise we don’t bite,” he said. When she looked up at him, he grinned, sharp and quick. “Not unless you ask.”

 

.

 

She’d felt it, she’d felt it all day, but somehow she was still surprised. 

There was a hush to the room, a horror. A girl at the Hufflepuff table was crying. Her friends clustered around her, patting her back. 

“What’s going on?” Harry asked, turning to look at Malfoy. He was watching the girl, his face tight. 

“Draco,” she said.  _ Soon _ , he’d said. “What’s happened?” 

He sighed, rubbing a hand over his face. “You’ll find out soon enough anyway,” he said.

“What?” she asked.

“Scrimgeour is dead.” 

_ People are scared, _ Scimgeour had told her. 

“Fuck,” she said. “Fuck, I have to--”

She looked up at the dias. Dumbledore’s chair was empty. 

“Harry!” Hermione descended on her. “Thank god,” she said, grasping her hand. “The announcement came out when you were flying, I didn’t know if you’d heard.”

Harry squeezed back tight. 

“What does this mean?” she asked and Hermione shook her head.

“I don’t know,” she said. “But it’s bad.” 

 

.

 

Halfway through dinner -- a terse, hushed affair, no one daring to speak above a whisper -- McGonagall took action.

“Everyone back to their dorms,” she said. “Classes are suspended until further notice.” 

She looked, Harry thought, almost scared. 

“We’ll let you know when we know more.”

Ron and Hermione disappeared to shepherd the younger years. Harry looked again towards where Draco was standing with the rest of Slytherin. He was talking seriously with Zabini, their heads hunched together. She found herself wishing he would look up at her. But he didn’t.

Harry pushed through the rest of the crowd towards the dias. 

“Professor,” she called, but the press of the crowd prevented her from getting closer to McGonagall. 

When she looked up again, McGonagall was gone, but she saw that Snape was watching her. When she made eye contact, he looked away. 

Harry was left standing there for a moment, until another student shoved her towards the door of the Great Hall, and she let herself be carried along with the momentum until she was out the hall and headed up to the dormitory. 

_ Soon _ , he’d said. 

 

.

 

When she woke the next morning, Hermione was already sitting up on the bed beside her, looking out the window. 

Harry crawled over to her, wrapping her arms around the other girl. 

They didn’t say anything for a long time. For what was there to say?  _ I’m scared? I think-- I think-- _

_ I think he’s coming for me next. _

 

.

 

Harry looked at the Hogwarts uniform at the foot of her bed and then crawled into an old Weasley sweater, one of Bill’s, and an old pair of leggings. When she went down to the common room she found most of the house clustered around an old radio. 

Harry recognized the voice immediately. 

_ Oh, pet-- _

“Rufus Scrimgeour is dead,” Voldemort said. “The Ministry is now under new leadership.” As if that was that, as if he had won an election, “I understand that this will be an adjustment for some people, that some people doubt the validity of my rule.”

“The validity of my rule,” Harry scoffed. 

This was absurd, this was a dream, this was--

“There will be no mercy for those resistant to the new regime,” he said. “In times such as these, what we really need is unity, and firm leadership.”

“You don’t have to be afraid,” Lord Voldemort said. “Not if you don’t resist.”

 

.

 

“What do you think he’s playing at?” Harry asked.

She, Ron and Hermione were sequestered in a corner of the Common Room.

Hermione shook her head, the bounce of her curls. “I don’t know,” she said. 

“I mean the whole bloody world is afraid of him,” Ron said. “Why does he need to sound so fucking--”

“Reasonable?” Harry asked. “It’s…” an abomination, a mockery of his monstrosity, “bizarre.”

“No,” Hermione said. “No, it makes sense. Fear is one weapon, but reason is another.”

“But, he’s,” A nightmare in a graveyard, a faceless, skeletal creature, a red-eyed children’s book monster, “he’s a monster.” Harry said. 

“Monsters wear lots of faces,” Hermione said, looking thoughtful. 

Tom Riddle, age sixteen, _ Harry Potter, I’ve so wanted to meet you.  _

“But what do we do?” Harry asked. She could hear the note of hysteria in her voice.

Ron reached for her hand. His palm was a sweaty, familiar weight. 

“We wait for Dumbledore,” he said. “Dumbledore will know what to do.” 

 

.

 

Teachers walked them to the Great Hall for dinner and then after dinner banished all the tables and started laying out sleeping bags. Harry was reminded of Third Year when they’d thought Sirius was the biggest threat, how ludicrous that was now.

Dumbledore still wasn’t back. 

Ron and Hermione were talking quietly in the corner and Harry was trying to pretend she wasn’t listening. Ron laid his hand on Hermione’s shoulder. Harry looked away. 

“Is there space over here?” 

Harry released a breath, her shoulders slumping forward. “Yeah,” she said. 

Draco came and sat beside her. 

The ceiling had turned dark, clouds obscuring the stars. Harry tried not to take it as a sign. 

Draco didn’t say anything for a long time and after a moment of sitting in silence, Harry let herself lean into him. He tensed for a moment and then relaxed, his hand going to her hair, running, almost hesitantly, through it. 

Harry watched the people gathered in small clumps across the grand room. More than one person was crying. After a moment, she closed her eyes.

“I’m scared,” she said. She hated how weak it sounded. 

She felt his breath against her hair. “You don’t have to be,” he said.

He’d felt  _ happy _ . 

“Yeah,” she said. “Yeah, I do.”

 

.

 

She woke in the morning and something had changed. 

Malfoy was curled towards her in sleep, his expression troubled. Harry rolled over onto her back and watched dawn lighten the sky. 

_ Harry _ .

She remembered two years ago when Moody -- Barty Crouch Jr, she reminded herself -- had cast Imperio on her, the pull in her gut, the longing. Jump. Jump. Jump. 

Harry stood up. 

She felt half-asleep, she felt drunk. She walked out the Great Hall. 

Her feet led her up the stairs. How strange it was to see her bare toes against the stone of the steps. How strange, how strange, how strange. 

And then suddenly she was outside the headmaster’s office. 

_ Dumbledore _ , she thought.  _ Finally _ . 

“Lemon meringue,” she said, and the eagle stepped aside. 

She didn’t hesitate outside the door, just pushed it open, still compelled by whatever force had brought her here. It was when the door swung open that she paused. The person sitting behind the desk was not Dumbledore. 

How strange, how strange, how strange.

It had been five months and sixteen days since Harry had seen Voldemort, but she still remembered him like it had been yesterday, his image haunted her, the scraped white skin of his head, the snakelike line of his eyes, the slits where his nose should have been. But this was not that man.

Tom Riddle was sitting in Dumbledore’s chair. No, it wasn’t Tom Riddle. Tom Riddle was--

Dead. 

And yet, somehow, this was the man Tom Riddle should have grown into, the history she had imagined for that eleven year old boy. He looked he looked --

“Hello,” he said. The casual lean of him in the chair, as if he belonged there.

“You,” she said, fumbling for her wand, but she had left it down in the Great Hall. Her pockets were empty.

“Happy to see me?” he asked, grinning. 

Tom Riddle, age sixteen, had a charming grin, like it belonged on his face. She couldn’t have imagined Voldemort smiling. Couldn’t have imagined--

Tom Riddle -- age what? thirty-five? -- regarding her with a curious expression. 

“Where’s Dumbledore?” he asked her. 

She looked around the room wildly. Her hand grasped one of the gismos -- she’d hurled it at the floor less than a year ago -- and shot it at his head. He just lifted his hand and it stopped. 

“Naughty girl,” he said, discarding the object. “But no matter.” 

Harry tried again, grabbing another metal contraption, but he lifted his hand again and she froze, ice spreading through her limbs. The gadget tumbled to the floor, shattering.

She could feel panic rising. She was going to die. She was going to die. She was going to--

“I’m not going to hurt you,” he said, standing up from the desk and walking towards her. She would have flinched, would have screamed, would have--

“I’m just going to ask you again, nicely. Where. Is. Dumbledore?” 

His hand brushed her cheek and she felt her face twist, but the rest of her remained frozen.

He was watching her too closely.

“I don’t...I don’t know,” she said. 

She felt his mind against hers, concentrated on everything Snape had ever taught her. 

“You’ve been practicing,” he said, leaning closer to her. “Good.”

His hair was short, but glossy and thick. One of the strands was out of place. She concentrated on that, that stupid piece of hair. She wasn’t here. She wasn’t--

His hand cupped her cheek, forcing her to look at him. 

“Tell me,” he said. His hand was warm. It should have been cold, should have been--

“I don’t know,” she ground out. 

She built the wall, reinforced it, built it again. _ I am not weak _ , she thought.  _ I can keep him out. _

He leaned back.

“There’s nothing in your head I haven’t seen,” he said, finally. “Your mind really is abysmally open much of the time.” 

“Fuck you,” Harry said. 

He just looked at her for a moment. And then he moved back over to the desk, Harry watched him go. His hand on the side of the wood, as if it felt familiar. 

“It’s no matter,” he said. “I can wait. I’ve been waiting for years after all. And Dumbledore will come eventually, he’s too much of a fucking do-gooder to do other ways. Or maybe I overestimate him.”

“He’s a good man,” Harry said. “A better man than you’ll ever be.”

He moved to sit back in the chair, looking at her. She wanted him to stop. She didn’t like his eyes on her, didn’t like--

“You’ll see it my way eventually,” he said. 

“I won’t,” Harry said. 

He smiled, the slow stretch of his teeth. She didn’t like how clear he felt, like he was overpowering her, like he was more real even than she was. 

“Yes, you will,” he said. 

 

.

 

Harry’s limbs ached, a steady, distracting throb. She felt helpless, she felt so fucking--

She watched Voldemort as he plucked a book off the shelf by Dumbledore’s desk. 

“You know he started to confiscate books from the restricted section after I left,” he said. There was something loving in the way he held the book. It was wrong for him to seem loving about anything. “Of course it was too late by then. Still, it seems a shame to deny young witches and wizards knowledge, don’t you think?” 

This was absurd, patently, stupidly absurd. He shouldn’t be here, he shouldn’t even  _ exist.  _

“They’ll be wondering where I am,” she said. 

He looked up at her, stopping, briefly, his examination of the book.

“Perhaps,” he said. 

It was on the tip of her tongue, on the edge of every thought. “Are you...” _ are you going to kill me? _

“If I was going to kill you I would have done so, already,” he said, returning to the book. He looked almost  _ studious _ , like some strange sort of professor. It was ridiculous.

Harry couldn’t mesh this Voldemort with the creature who had come crawling out of the cauldron two years ago, with the monster who had haunted her dreams, with the phantom that had stared her down in the Ministry. 

_ Did Dumbledore know? _

“What if he doesn’t come?”

He sighed, looking exasperated. “He will,” he said. “Now, don’t make me freeze you again.”

Harry wanted to say that she was still frozen, but thought that was probably the type of comment that would just irritate him. 

She should be plotting, she should be doing something, but she didn’t have her wand, she didn’t have anything, just this, just the disconcerting sight of him. 

“What are you going to do?” she asked. “When he gets here?” 

He looked up at her again. His eyes were dark on her face. “What am I going to do?” he asked. “I’m going to kill him.”

 

.

 

Hours passed. Tom Riddle, Lord Voldemort, this apparition in front of her, sat and read at  Dumbledore’s desk and Harry stood. She was still in her pajamas. She found herself looking at the chipped polish on her left foot, at Gryffindor’s sword on the wall, at the Sorting Hat on the shelf to the left of the desk, at anything, anywhere but at him. 

But eventually, she got bored. 

He looked-- He looked-- 

“You’re staring,” he said. 

“You’re holding me captive,” she said. 

He opened his mouth to speak, but then he froze. 

“He’s here,” he said, standing abruptly from the desk, and walking towards Harry. 

She thought for a moment that he was going to touch her, but then he didn’t, just stopped in front of her. His eyes dipped to her collarbone for a moment, then back up to her face, as if he were searching for something there. “Don’t try anything,” he said. 

He was far too close to her, the sight of him blocking out everything else. 

And then she unfroze.

She stumbled briefly, her limbs like jelly. 

“Come along,” he said, turning and striding out the door. 

_ What would he do if she didn’t come? If she locked the door behind her and stayed shut up in the tower while he went to meet Dumbledore?  _

But she would never do it, she would never let him loose on the school, not when she might be able to stop him.

She followed after him.

 

.

 

He walked at a quick pace down the deserted halls. Harry struggled to keep up with him. He was so fucking tall. 

“How did you know I would follow you?” she asked. 

He didn’t respond, just took a sudden turn into a shortcut, the one Harry always took when she was coming from Gryffindor tower. Harry stopped for a minute, staring after him. The line of him framed by the hidden passageway, too broad to be a boy, too broad to be anything but a man. 

“Hurry up,” he said, looking back at her. 

Harry huffed, but scurried after him.

 

.

 

Dumbledore was standing in the doorway to the Great Hall.

His suit was a bright turquoise and it seemed so out of place that Harry felt momentarily stunned. 

Voldemort grabbed her arm, his hand large enough that it easily wrapped all the way around. He made her feel tiny. 

“Ow,” she said, but he didn’t respond, just started dragging her down the steps.

Dumbledore turned towards them and his eyes tightened.

“How did you get in here, Tom?” he asked. 

Voldemort stopped at the bottom of the steps and pulled her suddenly in front of him, like a human shield, his arm caging her against his chest. She tried to squirm free, but he held her fast. 

“Perhaps you should consider better wardings,” he said. “Or simply better guards.” 

“Are they dead?” Dumbledore asked. He looked an old man standing there.

Harry could feel Voldemort’s shrug, the shift of muscles. The Voldemort she had known had been skeletal, a creature of bone and ash, had not been flesh, had not been the warm press of man against her. You could not hold a monster. 

Except you could. 

“Let’s not let anyone else get hurt, shall we?” he said. 

Dumbledore’s eyes shifted to her. 

“Let Harry go, then,” he said. 

Voldemort laughed. “I don’t think so,” he said. 

He walked forward, dragging Harry with him. She had the thought, suddenly, that she could easily stand on his toes, let him lead her, like she had seen the fathers and daughters do in the movies Dudley used to watch.

“She has nothing to do with this, Tom,” Dumbledore said. 

“No, you made sure of that, didn’t you, old man?” he said. “Were you ever going to tell her what she is?” 

What she is. Not who, but what.

Dumbledore’s face paled. This was not the man who had battled so confidently with Voldemort in the Department of Mysteries, who had sent the golden statues to protect her.

“I--,” he said, raising his hand weakly. 

It looked ghastly in the torchlight, a sick, rotting thing.

Voldemort, surprisingly, laughed.  “I see my magic has already been doing good work,” Voldemort said, using his free hand to gesture at Dumbledore’s. “How long do you have left? Two months? Less? It’s a wonder you’re not dead already.” 

“There are many wonders in the world that you could never hope to understand, Tom,” Dumbledore said. 

_ Why wasn’t he doing something?  _ Harry wondered. 

“All these years later and you’re still spouting the same bullshit,” Voldemort sneered. “I have half a mind to just leave you here to die.”

“You will not harm the children here,” Dumbledore said. “Nor anyone else here in these walls.”

Voldemort laughed. “You never did understand me, did you? Not even when I was a boy.” 

“Hard to understand the ravings of a lunatic,” Dumbledore said. 

Harry could not see his face, but she was sure that Voldemort was smiling. 

“Enough talk,” he said. 

He shoved Harry to the side, throwing her back with magic until her back hit the wall with a thump. She struggled to her feet, winded, attempting to move towards the fight, but there was a shield locking her in place. She pressed her hand flat against the invisible surface, but it did not give. She could scream, she could --

But the duel had already begun. 

She still remembered the duel at the Ministry, the flashes she had seen from beneath the wizard’s golden body, the sharp, aggressive dash of Voldemort’s wand, his face blown wide by manic, terrifying glee, the strange, otherworldly calm on Dumbledore’s face, how the duel had seemed to march to the tempo of Harry’s frantic heart. 

This was not like that. 

This Voldemort was exacting, precise. Watching him duel was an art in itself. This was a man who loved magic, revelled in it, and knew how to use it. 

_ How am I supposed to fight him, _ she wondered,  _ how was anyone? _

It was strange to watch Dumbledore duel, though it was not the first time Harry had seen it. Dumbledore belonged seated behind his desk, regarding Harry from beneath his spectacles, he should not be dodging curses, should not be raising his wand in battle. It was wrong, but it was happening, Harry could not deny the evidence before her eyes.

As the duel raged on, it became obvious that Dumbledore was at a disadvantage. He looked old, Harry thought with a rush of panic, and Voldemort — or was he Tom Riddle? Harry didn’t even know — moved liked a young man. And Dumbledore was fighting with one arm. And Voldemort kept approaching.

Harry pressed herself full bodied against the shield, but she could not get closer, could only watch. 

The sound beneath the shield was warped and Harry could not hear clearly what they were saying, but she was watching Voldemort when he formed the words and Harry found herself scrabbling forward, throwing herself against the shield, clawing. 

_ Avada Kedavra.  _

And Albus Dumbledore’s body fell to the ground.

Dumbledore was dead. Dumbledore was-- 

Harry thought she might be screaming. The shield gave way and her knees hit the stone floor and then she was crawling towards Dumbledore’s body, heaving.

Voldemort was watching her. 

“This really is pathetic,” he told her, as she fell over his body. 

She pressed her ear to his chest, listening frantically for a heartbeat, but there was nothing. There was nothing. 

She couldn’t catch her breath, every drag from her chest a hiccuping mess of emotion. 

“Calm down,” Voldemort said.             

His hand fell to her shoulder and she jolted, trying to drag herself away from him. 

“Don’t touch me!” she screamed.

But he just gripped the back of her sweater and dragged her to her feet. 

“Come on,” he said. “I’m not done yet.”

 

.

 

It was night again in the Great Hall. The tables were back out and everyone was eating. When the doors swung open and Voldemort walked in, holding Harry by the neck, for a moment nothing changed. There was still the buzz of conversation, the clatter of dishes as people ate, and then the doors clanged against the wall and everyone looked up and saw them standing there.

Someone screamed. 

“Harry!” 

It was Ron’s voice. But she couldn’t bring herself to look up. 

All she could feel was his hand on her, the rough pads of his fingertips digging into the nape of her neck. 

“Dumbledore is dead,” he said. Just like that. Like he’d said about Scrimgeour. Except Harry had seen it. Harry had  _ seen _ it. 

Dumbledore was dead. 

McGonagall had risen halfway out of her seat. 

“I didn’t come here to fight,” he said. “Hogwarts, after all, was my first home. No student here will come to harm.” The weight of his hand was stifling her. It felt  _ hot,  _ like a brand.  _ Get off, _ she thought.  _ Get off. Get off. Get off. _

He tightened his grip.  

“And as for the teachers, as long as you don’t resist, no harm shall come to you either.” 

McGonagall had her wand out. Harry felt a sudden sharp surge of fear.  _ Sit down _ , she thought. And then just as strongly,  _ kill him, please, just fucking—  _

McGonagall walked down the steps until she was facing them.

“Minerva,” Voldemort said, wrapping his arm around Harry again, shifting so she was fully covering him. She could feel the full heat of him pressed against her body.

“It’s you,” McGonagall said. Her face looked stunned. Harry had the shocking realization that they must be the same age, that McGonagall might even have known Tom Riddle. 

“It’s me,” he agreed, like he wasn’t just the same as he’d been when he’d looked the role of monster. 

And he was. He was just the same. He wasn’t that boy, that boy that Harry had felt sorry for, Merope Gaunt’s son, that boy was—

Dead.

“Hiding behind a child, Riddle?” McGonagall asked. That same judgmental look, the look that had cowed a hundred students, was now directed at the most feared man the wizarding world had ever known. Harry could laugh. Harry could cry. “That seems a little low class, even for you.” 

Voldemort spread his free arm. “I am but one man,” he said. “And Harry’s not really my prisoner, is she?” 

She wasn’t even struggling. Why wasn’t she even struggling? She tried to muster the will to do it now.  _ But what good would it do? _ she thought. 

He felt so  _ warm.  _

She elbowed him, hard in the stomach. He let out a little oof of pain and his grip loosened and then Harry was running. 

She didn’t even make it five steps before his hand caught the back of her jumper, bunching in the warm wool. 

“Don’t embarrass yourself,” he said, lowly, dragging her back into him. 

McGonagall was watching her with tight eyes. 

“You don’t want anyone else to die, do you, Harry?” Voldemort asked her. His breath in the shell of her ear. 

Her cheeks were still wet, still ragged.  _ Kill him _ , she thought.  _ Kill him, kill him, kill him. _

She shook her head. 

“Please,” she said. 

McGonagall took an almost self-conscious step forward. 

Dumbledore was dead.

On the dias, she could see Snape at the end of the row. He’d risen from his chair, and unlike the other teachers, he didn’t look surprised by this turn of events. He looked… 

Sad. 

He shook his head. 

“Don’t fight,” she said. “Please just…”

But McGonagall was already raising her wand. 

Harry clawed at Voldemort’s arm, his hand, anything she could reach. But it didn’t matter. It didn’t fucking matter, because he was already moving, his arm cinching so tight around Harry’s waist she couldn’t breathe. 

“Crucio,” he said, so matter-a-fact he could have been saying anything. 

And McGonagall fell to the ground, screaming. The Great Hall rang with it. Harry still remembered the pain, the bone crunching ache of it. 

“Stop,” she said. Stop. Stop. Stop.

But the screaming kept going. More than one person was crying, great heaving, hiccuping sobs of it. A cacophony of fear.

And then the screaming stopped. 

Harry could see Marietta Edgecomb crying so hard that snot was running down her face. 

McGonagall was still gripping her wand Harry saw. Her body was twisted, contorted, but it didn’t matter. She was still gripping her wand. 

_ Kill him, _ Harry thought. 

“Do you see what happens if you try to resist?” Voldemort asked, looking up at the the rest of the teachers, at the students cowering on their benches. 

The spell, croaked and distorted, but still  _ there. “ _ Avada—“ 

“Avada Kedavra,” Voldemort said and then McGonagall was still. 

Someone screamed. It might have been Harry. She could still feel his arm suctioning her. 

“A shame,” Voldemort said, knocking McGonagall's wand from her still hand with his foot. 

She was breathing so hard she thought she might be hyperventilating. 

“Stop,” he said, sharply, abruptly covering her mouth. 

She could taste his skin. It was overwhelming, it was revolting, it was --

And then she was breathing again.

“Now that that’s out of the way,” Voldemort said, removing his hand from her mouth and rubbing  it on the leg of his trousers. “There will be some changes coming for Hogwarts, some changes coming for all of the wizarding world. I want all of you to be ready for them.” 

He was met with silence. 

“Resistance is futile,” he said. “You’d do well to remember that.”

He released Harry, pushing her off towards the Gryffindor table. Two third years she didn’t know caught her. 

“Snape,” Voldemort said. “Clean this up.” 

And Snape stood up. “Yes, sir,” he said. 

The girl on the left was stroking Harry’s hair softly, soothingly, but Harry couldn’t take her eyes off of Voldemort. He looked he looked --

And then he was turning and walking out the door to the Great Hall. 

In the distance, Harry could see Dumbledore’s body still crumpled at the base of the doors, the turquoise of his suit bright against the dull stones. She wanted to scream, to keep screaming, to wake and this to all have been some terrible dream. 

The door to the hall slammed shut.

And all hell broke loose. 

 

.

 

“Harry!”

Hermione was holding her. Harry breathed in her familiar scent, lavender and parchment, and clutched her back, so tightly she worried she might be hurting her. 

“You’re okay,” Hermione was saying. “You’re okay.” 

But Harry wasn’t okay. Nothing was ever going to be okay again.

Ron was on the other side of her rubbing her back. 

“He didn’t hurt you?” he said. 

“No,” Harry said. She could hear the  _ why?  _ in his tone. “No, he didn’t hurt me.” 

“Order!” Snape called. 

People were in hysterics.  _ Harry  _ was in hysterics. But, she thought, if there was a time for hysterics, it was now. 

Dumbledore was dead.

Sirius was dead.

McGonagall was… 

Dead.

_ Who was left to fight?  _

“Return to your dormitories,” he said. “An announcement will be made in the morning about how we will proceed.” 

It seemed ludicrous that anything should happen after this day, that everything wouldn’t just stop. 

_ Who was going to move the bodies?  _

People started standing up, started heading towards the doors as if on autopilot. Ron and Hermione both looked at them. 

“We should…,” Hermione said. 

“Go,” Harry said. She wanted to lie down on the floor and never get up. She wanted to sear the last twelve hours from her brain. 

“We’ll be back,” Ron said. 

Harry didn’t want to get up off the bench, but she forced her legs to stand. 

She looked back up at the dias. Snape was watching her. When he saw her looking, he turned away. 

Someone grabbed her arm and she started. 

But it was just Draco, his eyes dark and frantic. 

“Are you okay?” he asked, seriously. 

Harry shook her head, and then before she really knew what was happening, she was crying. He looked startled by this development, but then he was wrapping her in his arms, murmering, “shh,” softly into her hair. 

She bunched her hands in his shirt, pulling and pulling, and he let her. 

“What are we going to do?” she asked him.

_ What are we going to do? _

He was quiet for a long moment, and Harry thought that he might not respond. 

“What we have to,” he said, finally.

 


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hi i'm back from the dead! sorry for the crazy long wait (life and school and the fact that i'm trying to write a novel? why?). i should be posting a little more regularly now that it's summer. thanks to everyone who has read/kudos'ed/commented so far, lots of love!

Draco walked her back to the Gryffindor dormitory. The portraits were babbling, calling out to each other, frantic and too loud.

_Had they seen--_

_His body, on the steps of the front hall--_

_Was Dumbledore--_

_Was he--_

He was. Dumbledore was dead. Harry wondered how many more times she would have to hear it before she believed it.

Draco’s hand on her arm was cool and steady. He led her up all the staircases, not saying anything, but she found that she was glad for his presence. Ron and Hermione met them on the staircase. Ron’s face twisted when he caught sight of Draco with his arm around Harry.

“Do you want me to come up?” Draco asked her, seriously.

She frowned. “I don’t think you can.” She couldn’t picture him in the Gryffindor tower, surrounded by all that red and gold, the armchairs where she and Ron and Hermione had spent their childhood.

He scoffed. “I think at this point, I can probably get away with it.”

“Harry,” Hermione said.

Harry turned to look at the other girl and felt herself wilt.

“Come on, hon,” Hermione said and took her arm. For a moment, Draco didn’t let go and she was caught between the two of them.

“Draco,” Harry said, and he dropped his hand.

“I’ll see you in the morning,” he said.

Harry turned to head back to the portrait hole, but Draco called her name. She looked back at him.

“Buck up, Potter,” he said, after a strained moment of silence. “It’s going to be alright.”

She didn’t see how.

“Come on, Harry,” Ron said, taking her other arm, and they led her into the Tower.

 

.

 

“What happened?” Ron said, once they were inside. The common room was crammed with people and his voice was a hushed whisper. “Do you think he’s everywhere then? My family? Do you think they’re alright?”

“I don’t know,” Harry said, honestly. “He didn’t tell me anything.”

Ginny leapt up from her spot by the fireplace and joined them. She looked drawn and pale. It must have been as strange for her as it was for Harry herself, Harry thought, seeing Voldemort like that, like Tom.

“Come on,” she said, pulling Harry’s hand and leading her up the steps to the sixth year girl’s dorm.

It was empty and the group of them collapsed on Harry’s bed. Harry expected everyone to start talking at once, but instead it was almost disconcertingly quiet.

“Start from the beginning,” Ginny said, finally.

Harry stood up from the bed, going over to the window. It was dark outside, and the familiar lawns had become foreign and strange. In the distance, she could see sweeping black forms circling the school.

“Dementors,” she said.

“Harry,” Hermione said. “Tell us what happened. Did he hurt you? Did he--”

“Where would we even go?” she said. “Is anywhere even safe anymore?” Hogwarts had always been the safest place. Safe because they had Dumbledore, and then he, Voldemort, Tom Riddle, had just walked in like it was his, his and not Harry’s.

_Hogwarts was my first home afterall._

“Harry,” Hermione said.

Start from the beginning, Ginny had said. So she did.

 

.

 

After, they all curled up on Harry’s bed, her head cushioned on Hermione’s shoulder, her calf pressed to Ginny’s stomach, Ron’s arm thrown over her shoulders. Harry had thought she wouldn’t be able to sleep, that she would be too haunted to, but soon she found herself drifting away.

She dreamt of snakes, of the night sky bright with stars, of a hand on the nape of her neck.

She woke tired.

 

.

 

It was crazy, for the next day the Great Hall looked the same as it always did.

Someone had moved the bodies.

“Are we sure this is the right thing to do?” Ginny asked. “Just staying, I mean.”

“No,” Harry said.

The Headmaster’s chair was empty.

Someone tugged on her arm, and Harry started, raising her elbow to shove it back into them.

“Fuck, Potter, it’s just me.”

Malfoy was staring down at her. He wasn’t wearing the uniform, just a pair of dark trousers and a dark sweater. His hair was slicked down and Harry had the urge to ruffle it. She felt she kept trying to change him. Still, she felt uneasy with this Malfoy who looked so like her childhood tormenter. She wanted to return to that day in the skies, when he had smiled at her with windblown hair.

“Come sit with me,” he said, taking her arm.

She looked over at the Slytherin table where Greengrass and Zabini were watching them, and then back at Gryffindor, Colin Creevy was watching the exchange with wide eyes and Neville was staring into his porridge with an expression akin to dread.

“I think I should sit with my own house,” she said.

He huffed a breath. “Alright,” he said, swinging a leg around the bench and sat down.

The four of them watched him, agog.

“You can’t sit here,” Ron said.

“Why not?” Draco asked, laddling some porridge onto his plate.

“Oh, just sit down, Ronald,” Hermione said. “It’s not worth raising a huff.”

Harry slid into the seat next to Draco. He smiled over at her. It was a nice smile, she thought. How funny, for so many years she never could have imagined that he’d ever smile at her like that, like she mattered.

And then the doors to the Great Hall swung open and Lucius Malfoy swept into the Great Hall.

The days in Azkaban hadn’t been kind to Lucius. His face had hollowed, his eyes pressed into his face, his cheekbones pieces of flint. His hair, previously long and pristine, was now shorn close to his head. He looked a different man, still austere, still commanding, but harder, harsher even.

“Draco,” Harry said, but he didn’t even look surprised, turning to watch his father stride up the center of the room. And why would he? Harry thought. Wasn’t it more likely that he’d known this was coming all along? And his father was spearheading it. But he didn’t make a move to leave Harry’s side.

“What’s happening?” Harry asked him, but he just shook his head.

“You’ll see,” he said.

Lucius made it to the front of the room and tapped his staff hard against the stone floor, magic reverberating through the hall. The room already quiet, turned dead silent.

“Good morning, students,” he said, giving them a smile. It sat wrong on his face. “You must, of course, be wondering what comes next for you. School will return as usual with some slight changes to the curriculum. For the moment, Care of Magical Creatures and Transfiguration shall be placed on hold, until we are able to find suitable replacements.”

Hagrid, Harry thought with a rush. Something had happened to Hagrid. She wanted to vomit. Draco put his hand on her arm, squeezing. For a moment, she couldn’t tell if it was meant to be a comforting gesture or not. But when she looked over his eyes were soft.

“He’s fine,” he said. “Fled, great coward.”

Harry shot him a look, but then Lucius was speaking again.

“Defence Against the Dark Arts has been reassigned to be slightly more… inclusive. There will also be a mandatory dueling class for the upper years. New schedules are coming around. The standards will be much higher under our Lord’s rule and expect that you will work much harder than you have before. He is not a man easily impressed.”

Harry thought of Voldemort in battle, the sharp precise wand movements. _No_ , she thought, _no, he wouldn’t be easily impressed._

Lucius sat down at the table, taking the vacated Headmaster’s seat, and the hall immediately broke out in chatter.

“What’d you think it means?” Ron asked. “Are we fucking learning the Dark Arts now?”

Harry looked back at the table. The teachers all looked drawn and pale, but they were all there. All but Hagrid and Mcgonagall.

“Do we fight it?” Ginny asked, turning to look at Harry. Harry wished she wouldn’t.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Malfoy said.

Ginny shot him a glare. “Of course you would think that,” she said.

“Malfoy’s right,” Hermione said. Ron turned to look at her in surprise. “There’s no point in fighting until we know what we’re up against.”

“So?”

“So, we figure out what we’re up against,” she said.

 

.

 

Malfoy walked her to Potions, holding her hand.

“I feel like you’re shepherding me,” she told him.

“I can let go,” he said, stopping and dropping her hand.

Her hand felt cold. “No, that’s not what I mean, I just…” She didn’t know how to finish the sentence.

“I know, babe,” he said. He came back towards her, taking both of her hands in his. “It’s all going to be alright.”

_I will not cry,_ Harry told herself. _I’m the fucking Chosen One and I will not cry_. “No,” she said. “No, it’s not.”

She didn’t know if it would ever be alright ever again.

 

.

 

Her classes that day were strained and awkward. All the teachers looked afraid. She left Draco at the portrait hole, though he’d offered to come in with her. She just wanted to curl up in bed. She collapsed in the armchair in her and Ron and Hermione’s corner and turned towards them.

“So?” she said.

“So, it’s bloody strange, isn’t it?” Ron said. “Dumbledore is…”

“Dead,” Harry said, running and hand through her hair and tugging on the ends. “I know. I saw.”

“Right, sorry mate, I know,” Ron said, shaking his head. “It’s just, it feels bloody normal, doesn’t it? Like where are all the Death Eaters and torturing and what not?”

“There are dementors on the front lawn if that helps it feel more dramatic,” Harry said, slumping in her seat. “I think there’s been enough horror.”

“No, I know,” Ron said, looking helpless. “Hermione? Help me.”

Hermione had been strangely quiet all day. Now, she bit her lip.

“I’m not sure we shouldn’t try to leave anyway,” she said, finally. “Once we get past the wards to Hogsmeade, we should be able to apparate.”

“And where would we go?” Ron said. “We can’t go to the Burrow. I’m not putting my family in any more danger.”

“We could live on the road,” Hermione said.

“For how long?” Ron said. “And how long until they find us?”

“I don’t know,” Hermione said.

“You-know-who, he didn’t even hurt her,” Ron said. “Harry’s alright, isn’t she?”

“And what?” Harry said. Harry was very far from alright. “You think that means we’re safe? He killed Dumbledore. He killed Mcgonagall.”

“I know,” Ron said. “I know that. But maybe I don’t want anyone else to die.”

His voice had risen and several other people looked over.

“We’re in a war,” Harry said, softly.

Ron slumped over in his seat, putting his head in his hands. “I’m fucking scared,” he said.

Hermione dropped down beside him, putting her hand on her shoulder. Harry looked away.

“I’m going to go to bed,” she said.

 

.

 

The dormitory was empty and she curled up on the bed. Yesterday, she had been standing in Dumbledore’s office as Voldemort had regarded her over the desk, looking at her like she wasn’t his enemy, like she was…

She didn’t know. But she didn’t feel like it meant anything good for her.

  
.

 

The next day was their first class with Snape after everything had happened. The class was called Various Forms of Defence and Dark Magic.

“Doesn’t quite roll of the tongue, does it?” Ron said, looking rumpled and unsure. But he was clutching tight to Hermione’s hand which seemed to steady him. Harry didn’t want to know what they had said after she had gone to bed, didn’t like how they now seemed something like a united front, apart from her. It was stupid to be jealous, she knew, but still, she was glad when Draco came over.

He put his arm around her and Harry let herself sink into it. His cologne was warm and comforting and she rested her head against his arm.

“Come on,” he said. “We’ll sit over here.”

Hermione gave her a look, but she didn’t say anything when Harry went to sit over with Zabini and Greengrass.

“You alright, Potter?” Zabini asked. There was something wrong in seeing him look so serious.

“Oh fuck off, Zabini,” she said, and he grinned, quick and sharp.

“Glad to see you haven’t lost your spark,” he said.

And then Snape called the class to attention.

For whatever reason, Harry had thought that he would say something about what had happened, to explain his role in everything -- Dumbledore trusted you, she thought viciously -- but he didn’t, just started into the lesson as if nothing had changed.

He didn’t meet her eyes the whole class.

 

.

 

“Miss Potter, stay after, please.”

Harry stopped, halfway to the door. Draco next to her, halted too.

“Is your name, Miss Potter, Mr. Malfoy?” Snape asked.

“No, sir,” he said, and ducked to brush a kiss to Harry’s cheek. Harry still felt vaguely overwhelmed by all these displays of overt affection, and she ducked her head, hoisting her bag higher on her shoulder.

“I’ll see you at lunch,” she said, softly, when it became obvious he wasn’t going to go until she said something.

“Alright,” he said, and then he was gone and out the door and she was alone with Snape.

“What?” she asked, turning to look at him.

If anything, the older man just looked tired, his body slumped and his face sunken. He looked like Harry felt. It made being mad at him one hundred times worse. But it was Snape that Voldemort had turned to.

_Snape, clean this up._

And he had. He fucking had.

“It is the Dark Lord’s wish that your Occlumency lessons continue,” he said, finally lifting his eyes to hers. They looked empty.

“Why?” she asked.

“I’m still your Professor, Potter, you will refer to me as sir.”

Harry grit her teeth. “Why, sir?”

“The Dark Lord does not share all his plans with me, Potter, you know as much as I do. We will commence at 9pm this evening.”

Harry couldn’t imagine practicing Occlumency now. Her thoughts felt unruleable. And if Voldemort wanted her practicing it, it made her want to do it even less.

“Sir,” she said, the word like poison in her mouth.

 

.

 

“What did he want?” Malfoy asked her when she slid into the seat next to him at lunch. She couldn’t see him taking up permanent residence at the Gryffindor table. It felt like a perversion of the real world. Still, the way that things were going, nothing felt real anymore. This, at least was harmless.

Harry smiled at him, digging into the mashed potatoes. “Nothing,” she said.

 

.

 

“You aren’t even trying,” Snape snarled.

Dumbledore’s body crumpled on the front hall steps, the bright fabric of his suit against the worn stone, Remus ruffling her hair at Christmas, his smile tinged sad, Voldemort appearing out of the cauldron, flesh appearing before his eyes, Tom Riddle at sixteen, the way he had smiled at her and

“Stop,” she gasped. “I don’t want to see that.”

“It is your mind, Miss Potter. Control it.”

“I can’t!” she cried out. She felt like screaming and raging and Snape just looked at her with dark eyes.

“I can’t,” she repeated.

She expected him to reprimand her, but he simply frowned and said, “That will be all for tonight.”

She’d felt as if she was gearing for a fight and her shoulders deflated. She grabbed her bag from the floor and made to leave.

“Potter,” she heard behind her and she turned back to Snape.

His eyes were unreadable.

“What?” she said.

She could have sworn for a moment he looked almost sad. But then, “Nothing,” he said. “You may go.”

 

.

 

When she got back to the dormitory, everyone else was asleep. Harry curled up with the Marauder’s Map. All the students were in their dormitories, not even the prefects patrolling this late. She looked for a moment at her trunk and then slipped on the invisibility cloak, and crept out the dormitory, heading towards the secret passageway towards Honeydukes. But when she got there, she saw that it was blocked, magic locked. She backed away, and tried the next one on the map, but that was blocked too.

_There’s nowhere to go,_ she thought, stopping for a moment in the middle of the hallway and trying not to hyperventilate.

There was nowhere to go.

 

.

 

_What was there to do next?_ Harry wondered. _What on earth could she possibly do?_

She was sitting in Potions. Draco was doing most of the actual heavy lifting of their potions work, glancing over at her with a worried eyes every couple of minutes. Harry was staring off into space, not able to summon the energy to reassure him. It was when she shifted here eyes to Slughorn at the front of the class that she got the idea.

As soon as class ended, she hurried up to him.

“I have to talk to you, sir,” she said.

It looked as if Slughorn had gained fifteen pounds in the last week. Even now, as she watched him, he plopped a candied chocolate in his mouth, chewing anxiously. “Oh, ask away, my girl, ask away,” he said.

Harry waited until the room was empty.

“I need to know what a Horcrux is,” she said, desperately. In the rush of it all, she had forgotten all about getting the memory from Slughorn, about all of it, the mission Dumbledore had never told her about.

Slughorn’s face tightened. “Dumbledore put this up to you, did he?” he asked, starting to shuffle away, but Harry grabbed his arm, her hand digging into the fleshy meat of it.

“Yes,” she hissed. “And now he’s dead. You have to tell me, sir. It’s a matter of life or death.”

“Yes, yes, that’s what I’m worried about,” he said, glancing anxiously about as if a Death Eater might be hiding behind one of the cauldrons.

“Dumbledore was showing me memories,” Harry told him. “Memories about Tom Riddle.”

Slughorn flinched at the name. “I didn’t know what he was,” he said, flubbering. “And I don’t know anything that can help you.”

Harry had little patience for this kind of garbling. “You know now,” she said. “And you have to help me. You told me my mother was one of your favorite students, now prove it.”

Slughorn’s eyes were panicked and watery, but after a moment of staring at her he assented. “Oh, yes, alright,” he said, his eyes darting to the door and then away.

“Tell me,” Harry insisted. Now that she’d remembered, it felt necessary that she know, that she start down whatever path Dumbledore had left for her. Because without it, without she didn’t have a clue what to do.

“Not here,” Slughorn said, in a hushed tone. “Meet me in my office tonight.”

 

.

 

“You think he’ll actually tell you,” Hermione whispered. Harry had pulled Ron and Hermione into the secret passageway on the fifth floor and Hermione had cast a quick silencing spell, but they were still whispering. They never knew who could hear. Now it felt like everyone was suspect.

“Seems like the best bet to figure out how to defeat him,” Harry said. She wasn’t sure anyone could defeat him. “It’s what Dumbledore wanted.”

“And then what?” Ron asked. “What can we do from in here?”

_What can anyone do?_ Harry thought helplessly. But she couldn’t let herself think that way, otherwise she would sink into her bed and never get up. _I am the Chosen One,_ she thought. _And I have to try, at least_. However impossible it felt.

Harry shrugged. “One step at a time, I suppose,” she said.

 

.

 

The lights in Slughorn’s office were dim and he closed the door quickly behind Harry, pulling her in and then slamming it shut. “No one followed you, did they?” he asked

Harry shook her head. She had checked on the Marauder’s Map. “We’re in the clear,” she said.

Still, Slughorn looked anxious, wringing his hands in front of him. _What could be so hard to tell her?_ she thought. But with Tom Riddle the possibilities seemed endless.

“Sit and have a drink with me,” he said.

Harry frowned. “I don’t want to have a drink with you. I want you to tell me what a Horcrux is.”

Slughorn puttered over to his tray of drinks anyways, pouring a glass of brandy with shaking hands. Harry watched him in exasperation. She felt antsy, like she was on the cusp of discovering something, something so big that it felt catastrophic.

“It’s terribly dark magic, of course,” Slughorn said, turning back to her, clutching his glass tight to him. “I had no idea what Tom wanted to do with it, purely academic I reasoned. He really was the brightest boy, none like him since…”

Harry had no desire to hear about young Tom Riddle. She could still see him in her mind’s eye, lounging in the chair by the fire in that easy way that he had, like he was just waiting to watch the world unfurl in front of him.

“... but no of course there wouldn’t be, silly of me to presume--”

“Tell me,” Harry said, cutting the man off. “Please, Professor.”

Slughorn took a deep breath. “It’s possible,” he said, “to split your soul, using the darkest of magic, of course. You must commit a truly atrocious deed, terrible stuff really, only the darkest of wizards would even consider it”

Splitting the soul, like a soul was a thing that could be seperated. It was beyond reckoning, a monstrosity.

“What happens to it?” Harry asked. “To the soul bit?”

“You bind it,” he answered, looking queasy at the thought. “To an object. The idea behind it is, of course, that with a bit of your soul outside yourself, you could never really die.”

Harry found herself wishing she’d taken the glass of brandy when he’d offered it. _How was she supposed to kill Voldemort with part of his soul outside of his body?_ If the idea of destroying him had seemed impossible before, it now seemed a gargantuan task. And who did she have to help her now that Dumbledore was dead?  She couldn’t let anyone else die for her, not if she could help it.

“And Dumbledore thought that Voldemort had made one?” Harry asked. If there was any possibility that she was misunderstanding this, she needed to know.

Slughorn jumped at the name. “Yes,” he squeaked. “Or at least he pestered me enough about it. The idea that Tom…”

“What was it?” Harry asked, desperately, moving across the room towards him. “What did he use?”

Slughorn looked surprised. “Well, how would I know?” he asked.

Dumbledore would know, Harry thought, frustrated. And he hadn’t told her.

“Well then, how would you destroy one?” she asked instead. “If I found it?” And that was a big if.

If possible, Slughorn looked even more uneasy. “I can’t recommend you attempting such magic, my dear. Why even some of the most powerful witches and wizards would have difficulty with such a task.”

“Professor,” she said. She knew how crazy all this sounded, but she had to, she had to try. “I am the Chosen One or have you forgotten? I’m the only hope the wizarding world has left.”

“I’m afraid, my dear,” Slughorn said, taking her by the arm and leading her towards the door. “That I’m not sure there’s any hope left at all.”

 

.

 

Harry beat her fist against the door, but Slughorn wouldn’t answer it, and after a minute of furious pounding, Harry gave up.

A Horcrux. The idea was repugnant. And she would have to find it and destroy it, and she had no clue how to do either of those things. The answer, the answer must have been somewhere in the memories Dumbledore had shown her, but she had no idea what they were pointing to. The only constant had been Riddle. She had thought…

She didn’t know what she’d thought.

A hand grabbed her arm and she swung against it, but as she turned in the person’s grasp, she saw that it was only Draco.

“You’re easily spooked,” he said.

_Wouldn’t you be?_ she thought.

“What are you doing down here?” she asked him.

He raised an eyebrow. “I live down here, what’s your excuse?”

_How much do you trust him?_ Hermione had asked her, and Harry still didn't have an answer. She ran a hand through her hair. It was getting long, longer than she’d ever worn it before.

She struggled for an answer that would appease him, one that would take the suspicious look from his eyes, one that wouldn’t seem like an outright lie.

“I was coming to see you,” she said, and watched his face smooth over. “But I got lost. Your common room is stupid, did you know that?”

“And why were you coming to see me this late at night?” he asked, moving closer to her, blocking her against the wall. He was smirking.

“Are you insinuating something, Malfoy?” she asked him.

His hand moved against her, skimming the top of her leg between her knee and her skirt and then up and over to her hip, pressing her fully back against the stone.

“Might be,” he said, and then he was leaning down and kissing her.

He hadn’t kissed her, really kissed her, since the broom closet, what seemed like lifetimes ago, and for a moment, she just let herself revel in the kiss.

And then, his hand on her waist gripped her harder, his thumb pushing into the bone of her hip, and she let out a small sound into his mouth. He swallowed it eagerly, opening her mouth further with his.

His mouth was wicked hot, and she wanted more of his heat, wanted to forget everything but this. She fisted her hands in the fabric of his shirt, pulling it out of his slacks, sliding her hands around the back until she met smooth skin.

Malfoy groaned, his own hands coming up to her blouse, unbuttoning the top button. And then the next one.

“We’re in public,” she told him. His mouth was scraping along her jaw, harsh and heavy.

“I don’t see anyone else around.”

“Peeves could drop a dung bomb on us at any moment,” she told him.

He pulled back from her. “Are you seriously thinking about Peeves right now?” he asked her. He nudged her knees apart with his own, pressing the heat of him further into her.

“No?” she said.

“Good,” he said, returning his mouth to her jaw line, sucking a wicked mark that made her let out another sound. He raised his eyes to her, pleased. “I’d hate to think my skills were _that_ lacking.”

“Well, maybe not _that_ lacking,” she said, grinning.

“Potter,” Malfoy said, moving so his face was right over hers. “Do shut up.”

And then he was kissing her again, and for a brief moment, that was all she was thinking about.

 

.

 

Harry ducked back into the common room, feeling vaguely as if she was doing something sinful, and found Ron and Hermione passed out in the chairs by the fire. She stopped for a moment, staring at the two of them. In sleep, they were turned towards each other, Ron’s hand resting on the edge of his arm chair like he had reaching out for Hermione.

They had stayed up for her.

“Hey,” Harry said, kneeling down beside Hermione. The other girl woke with a jolt.

“Oh, Harry,” Hermione said. “We were so worried when you didn’t come back.”

“Sorry,” Harry said, tucking her hair behind her ear. “Got er, sort of caught up.”

“Snogging it looks like,” Ron said, rubbing his eyes.

Harry flushed. “Was not,” she said.

“You have marks all over your neck, mate,” Ron said.

“And your buttons are done up all wrong, oh Harry, you could’ve gotten in trouble.”

“Malfoy is a prefect,” Harry pointed out.

“Yes, and he should know better,” Hermione said. “But so should you. Who knows what the punishments will be like under Voldemort’s rule.”

“You’re right,” Harry said. “Of course.”

“Oh, but that’s not what’s important,” Hermione said. “How’d it go with Slughorn?”

Harry rushed through the conversation she’d had with Slughorn, ending with the fact that he’d refused to tell her how to destroy them.

“Well, there’s nothing in the Restricted Section,” Hermione said. “I’ve been looking in my spare time and there’s nothing in them at Horcruxes at all.”

Harry frowned. “He -- Voldemort I mean, he said that Dumbledore had been confiscating books, even when he was in school.”

“You think they’re up in his office?” Ron asked.

“Could do,” Harry said. “Of course, it’s Malfoy’s office now.” Seeing Lucius sitting at the Head table was still the strangest thing about the new regime. She hadn’t talked to Draco about it, didn’t know how to correlate the two of them in her head.

_It was her fault after all that Lucius had even been in prison in the first place._

Harry shook her head, banishing the thought.

“Oh, well, and it’s not like one of us is seeing a Malfoy now, is it?” Ron said.

Harry flushed again, fiddling with the necklace around her neck. “I’m not seeing him,” she said. “I’m just--”

“Snogging him,” Ron said.

“No--”

“I’m just saying,” Ron said, putting his hands up. “Might as well use the resources we got.”

Hermione gave Harry a look, and Harry knew she was remembering their earlier conversation.

“I’ll figure it out,” Harry said.

Hermione bit her lip. “You really think he did it?” she asked. “That that’s how he survived? By breaking apart his soul?”

Harry nodded her head.

“Explains some of the crazy, doesn’t it?” Ron said.

“What could it be though?” Hermione asked, looking off into the fire place. “What would you put your soul into?”

Harry shook her head. “I think Dumbledore was trying to tell me in the memories,” she said.

“Wouldn’t have hurt him to be a bit more forthright, would it?” Ron said. Privately, Harry agreed. It felt like everything he’d said to her had been in code, and now with the codemaster dead, she had no clue what to do.

_How much the old man has kept from you,_ Voldemort had told her.

“We’ll figure it out,” Hermione said.“We always do, don’t we?”

“Yeah,” Harry said, though she wasn’t sure she believed it. “We always do.”

 

.

 

That night, she dreamed of a boy sitting out in the snow by the Great Lake. The pieces of white melted into the dark of his hair. Harry had the insane desire to put her hand through the thick weight of it.

_Tell me, Harry_ , he said. Tom Riddle’s smile was sinful. _What would you do to live forever?_

"What did you do?" she asked him. “Where is it? Where’s your Horcrux?”

He looked back out over the lake, his eyes on the horizon.

_Soon,_ he said.

  
  
  


 


	6. Chapter 6

Harry looked at herself in the mirror and flushed. There was a ring of dark marks all the way around her throat.

“Fucking Malfoy,” she said, trying to pull her hair forward to cover them.

“Good night?” Lavender asked, flouncing into the room, and raising her eyebrows at Harry.

Harry groaned. “What am I going to do?” she asked.

“Ask Ginny for some cover up maybe?” Lavender suggested. “All of ours is too dark for you.”

“I can’t go out like this,” Harry said. “I look…”

“Debauched?” Lavender said with a grin. “It’s about time too.”

“Here,” Hermione said, entering the room and throwing Harry one of the scarfs she used to wrap up her hair at night.

Harry gave her a thankful look, wrapping it around her neck, watching the marks fade beneath soft cotton.

 

.

 

Malfoy grinned when he saw her at breakfast.

“This is all your fault,” she told him, shoving him. He laughed, pressing a sloppy kiss to her cheek.

“You know you love it,” he said.

“Yeah, yeah,” she said. “Pass the bacon over here.”

 

.

 

“So, what’s the game plan?” Ron asked. It was still ridiculously cold out, but he, Harry and Hermione were walking the grounds, making trails through the thick snow. It seemed the easiest way to meet without anyone overhearing.

“We go after the books and work from there,” Harry said. Working one step at a time seemed like the only way things could begin to see possible.

“And how do we do that?” Ron asked. His face was pale with bright splotches of red from the cold across his cheeks, and Harry was overcome with a surge of affection. This boy that she met on the train all those years ago would follow her anywhere, she knew. She only hoped she led him the right way.

“Well, first,” she said. “First, we need reinforcements.”

“The usuals?” Hermione asked.

Harry nodded her head. “And one more.”

 

.

 

Harry stopped in front of the portrait of the trolls on the seventh floor, turning to look at Draco. He watched her with a bemused gaze.

“What?” he asked.

“Look,” she said. Standing here across from Draco, she was reminded painfully of the last year, how evading him and the rest of the goon squad had been something like a game for the army. Not so long ago they had been enemies. “I’m trusting you,” she said, finally.

He raised his eyebrows. “I already know about the Room of Requirement,” he said.

She shook her head. “That’s not what I’m trusting you with,” she said.

“What then?” he asked.

She took his hand to reassure herself.

“Harry,” he said, seriously. It was still strange sometimes to hear him say her name. For so long she’d simply been Potter to him. “Just tell me.”

The door to the room swung open and Ron’s head popped out. “Oi,” he said. “You lot coming in anytime soon?”

Harry took a deep breathe, and then turned to look over at Draco. “Welcome to the Resistance,” she said.

 

.

 

The Resistance was a small gathering. Ginny and Luna were sprawled on the bean bags in the corner, while Neville sat with Ron and Hermione at the table in the center of the room. Ginny looked up when they came in.

“Oh, look,” she said. “It’s enemy number one.”

Draco looked prepared to snarl back, but Harry laid a hand on his arm.

“Things change,” she said. “And we have bigger fish to fry.”

“So you have a plan?” Ginny asked, leaning forward towards her.

Harry thought “a plan” might be a bit of a stretch. She was, as per usual, flying by the seat of her pants.

“There’s something I need to do,” she said. “Before Voldemort,” she was gratified to see that nobody in the room, not even Draco, flinched, “can be killed. Dumbledore left me a mission.”

Luna nodded her head, seriously. “Father says that Dumbledore is involved with a conspiracy of gnomes. Perhaps we could go to them for help?”

There was a seriousness with which she spoke that was vaguely endearing, if not a little embarrassing. Ginny gave her an affectionate look, and patted her hand.

“Why was Loony invited again?” Draco asked.

Harry whacked him on the arm, hard, and he winced. “Play nice,” she mouthed at him, and he frowned.

“So what do we have to do?” Ginny asked. “Do you have a plan?”

“Well,” Harry said. “We’ve got to break into the Headmaster’s office.”

Harry’s eyes darted to Draco for a moment. His expression was neutral. “Why?” he asked.

“There’s information that we need in there,” she said.

“What information?”

Harry cast a glance around to the rest of the group.

“I can’t tell you that,” she said.

“But the rest of them know?” Draco said. His face was very still, and Harry found that she couldn’t read it.

“No,” she said, though it wasn’t exactly true. Still, she didn’t want to get Ginny and Luna and Neville more involved than she had to. This was her cross to bear. “You just have to trust me.” She took his arm. “Like I’m trusting you.”

He looked at her for a long moment.  Harry found herself flushing. There was something incredibly intimate about the way he was looking at her.

“Alright,” he said. “What do you need from me?”

 

.

 

Draco caught her arm as they were all turning to leave.

“What?” she said, but he was dragging her away from the group, into one of the passageways behind the tapestry of a ring of monks.

“Draco,” she said, but then he was pushing her back against the wall and kissing her, so that she couldn’t even speak.

His mouth was frantic on hers, almost desperate, and for a moment, she felt lost in his frenzy, half a step behind, and then his mouth was travelling lower. He tore the scarf from his neck, sucking the marks darker on her skin, and she let out a little mewling sound.

“Draco,” she said again. But this time it came out breathy.

“Love the way you say my name,” he said against her neck. “Tell me again that you trust me,” he said, pushing her farther up the wall, his hands moving from her neck, down across her blouse and then back up. “Say that you’re mine.”

“What?” she said.

He lifted his head. His face was hard to see in the dark passageway, just the shine of his grey-blue eyes, the sharp dart of his nose.

_I don’t belong to you,_ she thought.

And then, _I don’t belong to anyone._

He leaned forward again, his breath against her ear.

“You said that you trusted me, didn’t you?” he said.

His hand travelled down her body and then up under her skirt, pulling the material higher, higher. She shivered.

“Um, yes?” Harry said.

His hand played with the band of her underwear.

“Say my name,” he said.

She turned her head to the side. “Malfoy,” she said. Her mind had narrowed down to the feel of his fingers on the skin of her hip.

His grin in the dark was wicked. “Don’t tease me, Potter.”

He moved to pull her underwear down, stretching the elastic. His entire being was crowding her. And she didn’t know if she wanted to revel in it or to move away.

“Say yes,” he said.

She spread her legs wider, almost unconsciously. He pressed even closer to her, moving his hand from her hips to her cunt, pressing down with his palm. She squirmed under his touch.

“Say yes,” he said again. He started to move his hand, rubbing tight circles. She felt herself gasp.

“Yes,” she said, almost a whimper. Her eyes closed, her head going back against the wall.

She could feel his grin against her skin. “Yes, who?” he said.

His hand moved beneath the band of her underwear, working over the bundle of nerves there. She gasped.

“Yes, who?” he said again.

Her hand went to his hair, tugging on the strands. It was slippery beneath her fingers, not thick like she had expected.

_Tell me, Harry. What would you do to live forever?_

Panting, Harry pushed him off of her. “Get off,” she said. “Get off me.”

She opened her eyes, and Draco was blinking back at her.

“Harry,” he said. “Are you alright?

She ran a shaking hand through her hair. _What was that?_

“Yeah,” she said. Oh god, she thought. Oh god. Oh god.“Yeah, I’m fine.”

He reached for again. But this time, his touch was light. He pulled her into his arms.

It didn’t mean anything. Just her mind going in circles. But still, a steady flush had spread across her body, and she wanted out and away from Draco.

“You trust me, don’t you?” he said.

“Yeah, of course,” she mumbled into the skin of his neck. Though it wasn’t really an of course. It was a decision. But she’d made it now. There was no going back.

“Then tell me what’s wrong,” he said.

_It’s him,_ she thought, _it’s always him that’s wrong with me._

But she didn’t know how to say that without sounding certifiable.

“Nothing’s wrong,” she said, moving away from him. More than anything, she just wanted to be alone.

She could hear him sigh, though she wasn’t looking at him.

“Harry,” he said, reaching out for her again.

“Let’s go,” she said.

 

.

 

Afterwards, she went back to the dorm room, curling up in her bed there. She didn’t want to think about what any of it meant. She rolled onto her back, staring up at the red fabric of her canopy. However was she going to defeat him if she couldn’t even conquer him in her own mind?

One step at a time, Potter, she reminded herself.

One step at a time.

 

.

 

The next morning at breakfast, when Draco moved to talk to her, she ducked her head, letting her hair fall in a shield between the two of them.

Draco reached for her hand, and she moved it away, knocking over her glass of pumpkin juice.

The juice spilled across the table, ruining everything it touched.

 

.

 

It took Draco two days to get the password. He still walked her to class, sat with her at meals, but she couldn’t bring herself to talk to him about what had happened, not about any of it. But she could see that he was watching her closely.

_Freak,_ she thought with a stunning amount of vitriol. _I’m never going to be anything but a freak._

“Hey,” he said, softly.

“What?” she said, startled, pulling her head up.

They were studying in the library. Their classwork had accelerated with the takeover and suddenly Harry found herself overloaded with work. Maybe _he_ thought if they were too busy, then they wouldn’t have time to rebel. _Fat chance._ Still, it was Friday night and the library was full of people.

“Shhh,” a Ravenclaw a table over hissed Harry.

“Sorry,” she said, ducking her head back down.

Draco tapped his wand on a piece of paper and it flew towards Harry, unfolding in front of her.

_Are you mad at me?_

Harry looked back over at him. He was watching her intently. She sighed, her shoulders slumping.

_No,_ she scrawled back.

_Then why won’t you talk to me?_

_Because I thought about the young Dark Lord while you were getting me off,_ didn’t seem like a good enough answer. Or an answer she wanted to think about at all.

Drac snatched the paper back, and wrote on it again.

_I have the password._

She looked up quickly. He raised an eyebrow.

“Draco,” she hissed. “Give it.”

He shook his head, passing the paper back over.

_Not till you talk to me._

She sighed, and then stood, grabbing his hand and pulling him off into the stacks. She didn’t speak as they wound their way deeper into the rows of books. When she thought it was safe that she wouldn’t be heard, she turned back towards him.

“I just…” she huffed an irritated breath, “freaked, okay? I don’t-- I don’t know what I’m doing.”

She was almost surprised by the wave of panic that swelled when he came towards her.

“Harry,” he said. “I’m not going to hurt you, okay?”

“It’s not that,” she said, though of course it was kind of that. “I just don’t know how to do… this,” she gestured vaguely between them. One messy kiss with Cho hadn’t prepared her to...what? Be in a relationship? With Malfoy of all people?

“Do what?” he said, softly. He took her hands.

Harry resisted the urge to flinch away, but she was a Gryffindor. She held her ground.

“Do this?” he said, leaning forward and brushing his lips against hers. “Because I’d have to disagree.”

She laughed against his mouth, feeling herself exhale. It was just Malfoy. Infuriating, too-sure-of-himself Malfoy, but just Malfoy all the same. “Very smooth,” she told him.

“I thought so,” he said.

When he pulled back, he was smiling. “You don’t have to be afraid of me, Potter.”

“I’m not afraid of _you_ , you git,” she said, shoving him off with a laugh.

“Yeah?” he said. “Just my hands on your cunt?”

“Draco!” she hissed. “We’re in a library!”

“I don’t think the books mind,” he said.

“Yeah, well I do,” she said, sniffily, turning from him.

He followed right behind her, slinging an arm over her shoulder as they came out of the stacks. “Don’t be afraid to talk to me, Potter,” he said. “Seriously.” She turned to look at his face in close up. His face was earnest and open. “Or to ask me to do what I did to you again,” he said, with a grin. And she shoved him off her again. “I know you liked it Potter.”

“Yeah, yeah,” she said. “We all know you want in my knickers. Just give me the password and let’s get on with it.”

“Yeah, alright,” he said, leaning over and brushing a kiss to her cheek. “But just for you.”

 

.

 

“You ready for this?” Hermione asked.

The seven of them were sitting in the common room late that night. They would move the next day. It was strange to see Draco in the Gryffindor common room, and she couldn’t stop staring at him where he was sitting in between her knees, the firelight reflecting off the silver of his head.

“It’s not so different from the rest of our heists,” Harry said, shrugging. It was a casual attitude she was not sure she actually felt, but it seemed the only way to get through this. Already, the amount of pressure on her made her want to scream.

“Yeah, well last time the Dark Lord didn’t have control of the all of Wizarding Britain now, did he?” Ron mumbled.

“Yeah, helpful, thanks mate,” Harry said, leaning her head back against the chair.

“It’ll be fine, Harry,” Hermione said. She gave Harry what Harry thought was meant to be an encouraging smile. It looked a little strained around the edges. When was the last time she and Hermione had talked? Harry wondered. Really talked. Too long now. So much had happened since they’d wandered the Burrow grounds talking about Draco and Tom Riddle and what Horcruxes might be. She almost felt like a different person. “We just get in and out. Easy.”

“Easy,” Harry repeated.

Knowing her luck, it would be anything but.

 

.

 

The coin flashed in Harry’s hand. _Now,_ it read. And she nodded towards Ron and Hermione and they started towards the entrance to the Great Hall. Across the room she could see that Draco was watching her. He nodded.

“Fireworks!” Filch cried, running into the Great Hall. “Fireworks in the hallway!”

Lucius looked up from his food with a belligerent glare. “Can you not handle it?” he asked. “Or is that beyond the capabilities of Squib scum such as yourself?”

Filch started down the main row, squawking a protest, and they slipped out the door behind him.

“We have to be fast,” Hermione muttered.

They hurried up the deserted hallways, until they reached the familiar griffin outside the headmaster’s office.

“Sanctimonia Vincet Semper,” Harry said, and the griffin, with a glance at her, started to ascend.

“Purity will always conquer,” Hermione whispered.

“Blimey,” Ron said. “Can’t believe you’re dating such a tosser.”

“I’m not dating Lucius,” Harry said, defensively, as they started up the steps. But the words had chilled her. “Draco’s not his father.”

“You sure about that?” Ron asked. “He spent enough years torturing you.”

“And now he’s helping us,” Harry said, stopping and turning towards him. “He got the password, didn’t he?” She didn’t know why she felt the need to so strongly defend Draco, but he had been the only safe haven she had found since the world had ended. And she didn’t know how to explain that without it sounding weak or ridiculously girly. It wasn’t like she was _in love_ or anything, he just made her feel… normal. Just Harry. Not Harry Potter. Not the Girl-Who-Lived or the Chosen One. Just her.

“There’s no time to argue,” Hermione hissed, tugging on Harry’s arm. “Come on.”

The headmaster’s office looked the same, the changes Lucius had made minimal. She could see perhaps a couple of more objects on the side, a fanged ivory statue of a snake, and what looked like a picture of Narcissa on the desk, but besides that the office was as Dumbledore had left it. The last time she had been in here, Tom Riddle had been sitting at that desk. The last time she had been in here, Dumbledore had been alive.

“Where were they?” Hermione said.

“Behind the desk,” Harry said.

She looked down at the coin. No messages.

The books were where she had last seen them. They pulled them off the shelf, dumping them onto the desk. Not all of them were on Dark Magic and they sorted through them quickly.

“Blimey, this stuff is bloody disgusting, isn’t it?” Ron said, shuddering as he turned a page on a dissected body.

Hermione snatched the book from him, placing it in the take pile.

“Alright,” she said, pulling a stack of muggle novels from her desk and transfiguring the covers to look like the books they were taking.

Harry glanced again at the coin, but it was still blank.

“They would say if anything went wrong,” Hermione said, looking up at her briefly. “I’m sure it’s fine.”

“I’ll feel better once we’re out of here,” Harry said.

Harry flipped through the next book, running her hand down the index.

“Here,” she said. “Horcruxes.”

Hermione looked up swiftly. “Toss it,” she said.

“One sec,” Harry said, flipping to the page.

There were pages and pages on it, detailing what looked like some sort of ritual, the situations necessary to make one. Grisly, Harry thought, and flipped the page. But how to destroy one?

Her eyes lit on the bottom of the next page. _Why even some of the most powerful witches and wizards would have difficulty with such a task_ , Slughorn had said.

The book slammed shut.

“There’ll be time later,” Hermione said. “Come on.”

The last of the books sorted, they were putting them back on the shelf, when they heard footsteps behind the door. They all froze for a moment. Harry made a wild hand gesture.

_Under the desk,_ she mouthed.

They ducked down just as the door swung open.

“I don’t see anyone,” they heard Lucius’s voice say.

“They’re in here.”

Harry’s blood ran cold. She knew whose voice that belonged to.

Harry felt Hermione grab her hand, hard. She squeezed back.

A hand descended on her shoulder, yanking her up and she looked into the face of Draco Malfoy. His face was impossibly still. She couldn’t read anything at all in it.

“You fucking traitor,” Ron hissed.

Harry couldn’t think, couldn’t move. He shoved her forward.

Lucius was watching her with a sneer marring his face.

“Well, Potter,” he said. “Tell me what you came for and I might be lenient with you.”

Harry pursed her lips. She wasn’t going to say anything. She studied the ground. She could hear Snape’s voice in her mind. _Clear your mind, Miss Potter. Wipe it blank._ She would think of nothing.

She couldn't let herself think about any of it.

“The Dark Lord is on his way to question you now.” Her head snapped up and Lucius laughed. “Yes, I thought that would draw a reaction out of you. You would do well to tell me before he gets here. I doubt he will be as kind as me.”

Nothing. Nothing. Nothing.

Hermione and Ron were still behind the desk, though they had half-risen to their feet.

The fireplace whirled green and then Tom-- Voldemort was stepping out of the flames. He looked the same he had all those weeks ago, impeccable, his hair, his clothes, everything perfectly placed. She made to step forward, an almost instictual action, and Draco held her back with a hand on her shoulder. He shook his head at her.

She jerked her body and his arm fell off.

“This better be good Lucius,” Voldemort said.

His eyes scanned the room, landing on Harry.

He grinned at her, a casual, boy-ish movement, and she tore her eyes away.

“I should’ve known,” he said. He shrugged his jacket off, tossing it with a flick of his hand towards the coat rack. “So?” he said. “What’ve they done?”

“They broke into my office,” Lucius said.

Voldemort raised an eyebrow. “I’d gathered that,” he said. “And?”

“I was trying to ascertain that when you arrived, my Lord.”

“Perhaps your son might prove more useful,” Voldemort said. "Draco?"

Harry remembered that she’d had the thought that she couldn’t imagine Draco in the same room as the Dark Lord. Well, she supposed she didn’t have to imagine now. Voldemort walked over to him where he was standing beside Harry. They made a strange picture next to each other. One dark and one fair.

“They were looking for information,” Draco said. His eyes darted over towards Harry. “I don’t know what.”

Voldemort turned his gaze towards her and she raised her chin. She would not back down. She would not.

_Tell me, Harry. What would you do to live forever?_

“Nevermind,” he said. “I can imagine what. Did you find what you were looking for?”

She could feel the brush of his mind against hers and she struggled to keep it blank.

The Quidditch pitch after it rained, the roses outside of Privet Drive, Draco’s hands on her thighs and

Voldemort regarded her curiously. He came closer towards her until he was standing right in front of her. She could smell the fire on him.

He swept the hair off her neck, and then untied the scarf with slow, deliberate motions, pulling it off her neck until it was stripped bare. The tips of his fingers brushed against the bruised skin there, and Harry flushed self-consciously.

“I told you to watch her, not to fuck her,” Voldemort said, turning to look back over at Draco. “Though I suppose it’s no matter.”

He removed his hands from her neck and she exhaled, her chest contracting.

“You told me to get close to her,” Draco said. She did not turn to look at him. “This seemed like the easiest way.”

Voldemort laughed. “I see that teenaged boys haven’t changed.” He laid a hand on Harry’s shoulder, the weight of it warm and heavy, turning her towards Draco. Malfoy was regarding her with a neutral expression. She wanted to slap him, to claw at him and scream.  _Fucking traitor._  “Have they, Harry?”

“Fuck off,” she said, shrugging off his hand.

Her skin felt itchy and raw.

_You told me to get close to her._

How could she have been so stupid?

But this was a betrayal that was worse than the other one. It was one thing if he had turned her in for this one heist, if his loyalty to his father outweighed the one they had formed, but it was another if all of it, _all of it,_ had been a lie. She had trusted him. Not just with this, but with… other things.

She had known, known at the start of it, that something hadn’t been right.

_Draco Malfoy fancying her, what a laugh._

“Don’t be cross, Harry,” Voldemort said. It was wrong of him to say her name, her first name, like they were friends. “You can keep your little boyfriend. I won’t stop you.”

“Like you have a say over what I do,” she snarled.

She’d expected him to respond in kind, hate for hate, but instead he just laughed. “Oh, dear,” he said. “You really are an ill mannered little thing. Maybe in time I can bleed that out of you.”

She turned back towards him, raising her hand against him. He didn’t stop her and her hand met flesh. His skin was warm and pliant beneath her hands and then he was enfolding her in his arms, caging her in.

“That’s no way to treat your Lord, is it now?” he said.

Lucius, in the corner, looked aghast.

Harry kicked out, and hit Voldemort in the shins, and he cursed. She felt her limbs turn to jelly and she would’ve collapsed if he hadn’t caught her beneath her armpits.

She looked over and saw Ron and Hermione watching with wide eyes. She went still. It wasn’t worth it. Not when she knew the Horcrux was still out there.

“There you go,” he said, running his hand through her hair as if she were a child. “Come now.”

He deposited her in the chair across from Dumbledore’s.

“Now, Lucius, really,” Voldemort said, starting over towards the corner where the headmaster was standing. “If you can’t handle a bunch of errant teens, how do you expect to run an entire school?”

“My Lord, I thought--” Voldemort flicked his hand in a violent motion and Lucius hit the ground hard.

“You didn't think,” he said. “Obviously.”

Lucius raised his hand. Blood was leaking from his nose, dripping onto the tile floor.

“I thought that since it was the girl--”

Voldemort’s face tightened. “No one touches Harry Potter,” he said. “I thought I had made that perfectly clear. Do what you will with the others. The girl is to be left to me.”

“Yes, M’Lord, I’m sorry, M’Lord, I--”

Voldemort raised his hand again and Lucius went silent.

Voldemort turned then and came over to where Harry was sitting in the chair. Her legs were still spasming and she knew if she tried to stand she would fall to the ground. She couldn’t remember the counter curse, try though she might. Hermione would know.

“Harry,” Voldemort said, kneeling down in front of her. This close to her he looked disconcertingly human.

He placed both hands on either side of her face. She tried to move back, but he held her still. His palms were like heaters, deadly hot.

“You won’t do anything to cause a stir, will you?” he asked. “Because you wouldn’t want me to be angry with you, would you?”

“Fuck you,” she hissed, pulling hard with her head, but he held fast.

“That’s not very nice,” he said. “Your life is very comfortable right now, isn’t it? You have so many friends, that mongrel wolf as a father figure? I would hate for anything to happen to them.” He was watching her closely and she knew he saw her stiffen. “That had an effect, didn’t it?” he said.

He released her face and stepped back, though not as far as Harry would have liked. She couldn’t think in his presence. It was like he clouded everything. He was too much. Too much.

“They’re all expendable, Harry,” he said. “You and I?” He smiled, the pull of his lips spreading across his face, infecting. He should have been a statue. Beautiful marble. His face wasn’t meant to smile. “You and I are infinite.”

She wanted to say _fuck you_ again. Fuck you until she ran out of breath. _No one was expendable, fuck you._

But.

_You wouldn’t want me to be angry with you?_

As if everything up to now had been him playing nice.

And yet. She thought of Tom Riddle, age sixteen, in that shack with Marvolo, his own blood, the complete lack of empathy he had shown. No, she wouldn’t want him to be angry with her. Not when there was so much more she needed to know before she could kill him. Not when he so easily could take everything she held dear from her.

How easily he had overtaken them. How easily he held all the pieces.

She nodded her head.

“Good girl,” he said.

He turned again towards the fireplace. “Lucius,” he said to the huddled mass on the floor. “Don’t bother me with such trivial matters again.”

 

.

 

“Harry!” Hermione cried, coming around to the side.

She waved her wand over Harry’s legs and the movement returned to them.

Lucius rose from his position from the floor. His nose was bleeding, spreading blood across his face. It was a gruesome picture.

“Tell me what you took,” he said.

Hermione stood in front of Harry, shielding her. It should’ve been the other way around.

_The girl is to be left to me._

“We didn’t find anything,” Hermione said.

“Liar,” Lucius snarled, rising to his full height.

He flicked his wand and Hermione fell to the floor, screaming. Harry rose from the chair, her legs still weak, and she stumbled across the floor towards Lucius. He wouldn’t hurt her, not when he, when Voldemort, had explicitly told him not to.

“Stop it!” she cried.

Hermione’s screams were horrifying. Harry had almost reached Lucius, when Draco dragged her back.

Ron was standing frozen behind the desk, but then suddenly he was rushing forward too. And Harry cried out.

Lucius switched the spell to him with a wild flick of his wand and then Ron was collapsing too.

The two figures on the floor were like a scene from one of Harry’s nightmares.

Harry screamed.

“Harry,” Draco said. “Just calm down.”

She elbowed him hard in the gut and he released her.

“Fuck,” he said. And then she was stumbling again towards Lucius.

His face was frozen in vindictive glee. Harry didn’t even think to draw her wand before she was clawing at him.

His spell was halted midway and Ron’s screams froze.

She had barely made contact though, when Lucius caught her arms in his grasp. “Don’t be an idiot, girl,” Lucius snarled, raising his hand to strike her.

“You wouldn’t want to anger the Dark Lord, would you?” Harry hissed. She didn’t know how far his protection went, but she was willing to stretch it, and she was surprised to see that Lucius’ face turned scared, his eyes widening, and he released her.

And then she was falling to the floor, crawling over to her friends. Ron and Hermione were curled towards each other on the floor.

“Hermione,” Harry said, reaching them. “Ron.”

She grasped their hands, wanting to pull them both into her lap, to find someone to hold them both close to her, protect them forever. This was her fault. All her fault. If she hadn’t trusted Draco, if she hadn’t--

“Just tell him what he wants to know,” Draco said. “This can be over quickly. “

Hermione raised herself to her elbows. Her dark skin was washed pale, but her eyes were piercing and strong.

“We were looking for a spell that could kill Voldemort,” she said. “But we didn’t find anything.”

Lucius looked at her for a long moment. “Search her bag,” Lucius said.

Draco picked Hermione’s bag up and sorted through it for a moment. “Nothing,” he said.

Lucius pinched the bridge of his nose.

“Detention for the rest of the month, Weasley and Granger. And 200 points from Gryffindor. Each,” he said. “Now get out.”

Harry rose to shaking feet and then reached her hands down to Ron and Hermione, helping them both to their feet. She would support both of them if she needed to.

They limped from the room. And Harry didn't look back.

 

.

 

“You’re fine,” Pompfrey told Harry. “Just a simple curse, the spell’s side effects should fade in an hour at the most. Now, you Granger and Weasley, shall stay here overnight.”

“‘M fine,” Ron said, though he still looked pale and drawn.

“That may be,” Pompfrey said. “But you’ll be staying nevertheless.”

She disappeared into the side room.

“I’m so sorry,” Harry said, sinking into the chair beside Hermione’s bed. “This is all my fault.”

“Don’t be stupid,” Hermione said.

“Yeah, it’s that git Malfoy’s fault,” Ron said.

“If I hadn’t trusted him though--”

“Don’t, mate,” Ron said. “No point going down that road.”

“We’re fine, Harry,” Hermione said, patting her hand, though it was anything but true. “And we got the books, that’s the important bit.”

In the rush of everything that had happened, that seemed so secondary. But they had succeeded. Even though everything had fallen apart, they had succeeded. Harry exhaled.

“Go sleep,” Hermione said. “We’ll figure it out tomorrow.”

Harry wanted nothing more than to collapse in her bed and wake and this all to have been a terrible dream, but still--

“Seriously, Harry,” Ron said. “We’ll be fine.”

She frowned, but turned to leave.

She turned back once she was at the door.

“I love you guys,” she said.

“We love you, too, mate,” Ron said. “Now fuck off and go to sleep.”

 

.

 

Draco was waiting for Harry outside the hospital wing.

“Harry,” he started, when she came out.

“Fuck off,” she said, brushing past him

“Just let me explain,” he said.

He grabbed her arm, and she whirled around to face him.

“Explain what?” she said. “How everything was a lie? Thanks, I got that bright and clear, actually.”

“It wasn’t--”

“Oh, bullshit,” Harry said. “Bullshit, Malfoy.”

“They would’ve known you’d been in the room. There are alarms. It would’ve betrayed my position if I hadn’t told them.”

“Yes, sorry, we wouldn’t want to mess up your position as the fucking Dark Lord’s confidant, would we?”

“No,” Draco hissed. “Don’t be stupid. It doesn’t suit you.”

“Funny enough,” Harry said. “I don’t really care what you think suits me.”

She started again down the hallway. But he got in her way.

“It wasn’t a lie, Harry, please believe me. I--” He looked desperate. His eyes wide and frantic, his hair falling in his face. Despite it all she had the urge to sweep it back, to run her hand across his forehead.

Harry was embarrassed to find her eyes flooded with tears. _Weak,_ she thought, _fucking weak._

“ _He_ told you to get close to me,” she said.

“Yes,” he said. “Yes. That’s how it started, but--”

“You think I would believe you?”

“You felt it too,” he said. “I know you did.”

_I told you to watch her, not fuck her._

“I didn’t feel anything,” Harry said, coldly. She brushed him aside, and started down the hallway.

He called after her, but she didn’t turn around, just kept walking until she was out of sight, and it was only then that she let herself cry.

 

.

 

It was only when she got all the way back to the dorm when she remembered what Voldemort had said. 

_They’re all expendable._  


 

_But you and I are infinite._


End file.
